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Zrinko Ogresta: When you are invited to Palić, means your film must be good

19.07.2021.

On the second day of the Palić European Film Festival, July 18, the festival director Radoslav Zelenović, executive producer Ilija Tatić, program director Miroslav Mogorović, Official Selection programmer Nenad Dukić, Parallels and Encounters and the Young Spirit of Europe programmer Neil Young and Eco Dox and New European Documentaries selector Igor Toholj were speakers at press conference on the Great Terrace.

Actress Milena Zupančič, laureate of the Aleksandar Lifka Honorary Award for her contribution to regional cinema, director Christian Petzold, Aleksandar Lifka Award laureate in the category of foreign creators, producer Ada Solomon, winner of the Underground Spirit Award, Zrinko Ogresta director of Blue Flower and Gordan Matić, director of the Serbian Film Center, also addressed the audience.

Milena Zupančič spoke about her award: "It surprised me because I haven't worked on film much for many years, so I thought people have forgotten me. First of all, I feel very nice here, and you know what people say at my age - oh, if I could get an award for a young promising actress!” About the meeting at the Festival’s opening ceremony with Aleksandar Berček, with whom she once starred in The Promising Boy, Milena Zupančič said: "A very nice meeting. It's always a pleasure for me to meet colleagues I haven't seen for a long, long time, and we haven't really seen each other for a long time."

Christian Petzold spoke about his arrival at the Palić European Film Festival: "This morning I went for a small walk in the woods and I saw benches with names. I felt melancholy. Some are no longer alive, some are still with us. Then someone from the Festival approached me and said that my name will also be on the bench next year, which made me very sentimental. I came last night and I can say that the hosts are really great". Christian Petzold also recalled his first visit to a festival at the end of the nineties, when the hosts hadn’t been good enough because everyone had forgotten him, but there is no such loneliness at Palić.

Ada Solomon spoke on how she feels about receiving the Underground Spirit Award: "I am becoming more and more emotional, because the opportunity to have your work recognized is also a great responsibility. The last year and a half has been a period of evaluation of the past activities. I realized that, as a person, I can’t live alone. I was happy to be in this profession, thanks to which I live and work in a family, a community. I think that's also the strength of what we do."

Zrinko Ogresta said about his new film coming to Palić: “What in a way connects A Blue Flower with my other films is my preoccupation with female characters. In the time we live in, which is full of big topics and problems such as pandemics, interethnic conflicts, refugees, it seemed to me that I, as an author, should deal with the essential problems that actually concerne each of us individually. These topics are family and love. We sometimes miss such topics. And when it comes to the Palić Festival, there is an unequivocal opinion among Croatian directors that when you are invited to Palić, means your film must be good”.

Gordan Matić, director of the Serbian Film Center, spoke about FCS and the Palić European Film Festival cooperation and the newly established Association of Serbian Film Festivals (AFIFS), as well as the FCS Book Days and film poster exhibitions, which take place during the Palić Festival.

On the third day, on Monday, July 19, at the Summer Stage in Palić, the Festival presents films The Worst Person in the World by Norwegian director Joachim Trier at 9 pm and at 11 pm Only Human (out of competition) by Macedonian director Igor Ivanov. In the Parallels and Encounters program, film Fury by Petar Ristovski (17:00) will have its world premiere in the Abazija cinema in Palić, and later in the evening repertoire includes The Spring Poem by Natalija Avramović (17:30) and Ravine (19h) by Krasznahorkai Balázs.