JURY AND AWARDS
Free Zone Film Festival presents the following awards:
JURY
INTERNATIONAL JURY
Snežana van Houwelingen, a film production graduate from the Academy of Arts in Belgrade, has enriched her skills through esteemed programs, including EAVE, EAVE Plus, and ACE. Her recent work includes films like Mother Mara (2024) and A Good Wife (2016) by Mirjana Karanović, Darkling (2022), Bad Blood: Ancestral Sin (2021), and Occupied Cinema (2019). She has also succeeded with TV series like Morning Changes Everything (2018) and Bad Blood (2021). Her production, Operation Sabre (2024), was recently recognized with the Special Interpretation Award for Cast at Canneseries. Snežana teaches Film and TV Production at Belgrade’s Faculty of Media and Communications. She is a member of EFA and dedicates her time as a mentor at EWA, nurturing the next generation of female filmmakers with vast knowledge and experience.
Nadine Lange is a journalist and writer from Leverkusen, Germany. She studied at Ludwig Maximilian University in Munich and then attended the German School of Journalism in Munich. In 1999, she moved to Berlin, where she initially worked as a freelance journalist. She has been a culture editor at Tagesspiegel since 2010 and is jointly responsible for Tagesspiegel’s LGBTIQ section, Queerspiegel. Her debut novel, Ein Eis Mit Jo (An Ice-cream With Jo), was published in 2022 by Querverlag.
Photo: Sonja Nimajer
Nemanja Vojinović was born in Belgrade in 1989. He graduated in film directing at the Faculty of Dramatic Arts in Belgrade, with a feature omnibus Where is Nadja? after which he got his MA on the same faculty. His short documentary Reality, fuck off won awards at regional and international festivals. Nemanja entered the world of feature films by directing and producing his feature documentary debut, Las Distancias, in which he followed one Cuban family and their long-distance relationship. His second feature documentary, Bottlemen, about the community of plastic bottle collectors in the landfills of Vinča, won the Heart of Sarajevo for best documentary film in 2023.
REGIONAL JURY
Maja Šuša was born in Belgrade and graduated from the Academy of Arts in 2013. She works as an actress in theatre, film, and on television. Since 2017, she has been a member of the Association of Dramatic Artists in Belgrade with the status of a freelance artist. She is one of the founders and artistic director of the international short fiction film festival Bašta Fest in Bajina Bašta since 2014. She is also an author and host for five seasons of the radio show In My Garden on Radio Aparat. Maja was a participant in the Talents Sarajevo program for actors in 2014 and Berlinale Talents Actors Studio in 2023. She is a member of the European Film Academy since 2023.
Nemanja Bečanović (1977) graduated with specialist film and television directing studies at the Faculty of Dramatic Arts in Cetinje and obtained his master’s degree from the production study program. His debut feature film, The Last Chapter, premiered in 2011 in the main program of the Sarajevo Film Festival. The second feature film, Supermarket (2023), had its premiere at the Tallinn Film Festival in the competition selection Rebels without Reason, where provocative and experimental films of independent production are shown. He taught at the FDU in Cetinje and the University of Donja Gorica in the Film and Media study program. He was the head of the archives at the Montenegrin Cinematheque. In addition to his two feature films, he edited television documentaries. Nemanja composed music for the feature film Between Day and Night (2018) and the theatre plays At Noah’s Ark at Eight (2016), Ivo Vizin – Captain of Dreams (2018), and The Case of the Broken Vase (2024). He wrote music reviews for Monitor, Pobjeda, and Vijesti.
Maša Seničić was born in Belgrade in 1990. She graduated with a degree in dramaturgy and a master’s degree from the Department of Theory and History of the Faculty of Dramatic Arts, where she is now a doctoral student. She is a co-selector of the Brave Balkans program at the Auteur Film Festival. As the program director of the Filmkultura association, she contributes to the informal education of young people in audiovisual culture. As an author and editor, she was part of numerous media and self-initiated or institutional publications. She participated in various local and international initiatives, workshops, and events, primarily in film and literature, but also in interdisciplinary research/exhibition projects as moderator, coordinator, and/or mentor. She has published two poetry books: Okean (2015) and Povremena poput vikend-naselja (2019), for which she received the Mladi Dis and Dušan Vasiljev Award, respectively.
Photo: Nemanja Knežević
FIRST TWO STEPS JURY
Đorđe Bajić, born in 1975 in Belgrade, is a Serbian writer and critic with a master’s degree in the theory of art and media. He writes film reviews and texts from art and culture for Vreme, Nedeljnik, and Bukmarker. Together with Zoran Janković and Ivan Velisavljević, he is the author of the books Critical Guide to Serbian Film 2000-2017 and The Best Serbian Films of the 21st Century, and with Janković he wrote Critical Guide to Serbian Film 2018-2022. His story Košuta was included in the anthology BalkaNoir (2018), published in Greece, and the tale Besnilo 2.0 in Laguna’s anthology dedicated to Borislav Pekić – Pre Vremena Čuda. He is the author of the novels: Ostrvo prokletih, Žuta kabanica, Jedno đubre manje, Crveni sneg, Smrt u ružičastom, which was also published in English, Umri, ljubavi! i Jedno đubre manje, konačna verzija.
Photo: Ema Bednarž
Ljiljana Ilić has a German language and literature MA at the Faculty of Philology in Belgrade. She published two poetry books: Nije zabava to sve (It’s Not All Fun) and Preča posla (Better Things to Do). She is a member of the Pesničenje (Poetrying) organizing team, poetry events organized for years at the Rex Cultural Center in Belgrade and throughout Serbia. Together with the Art collective Škart and the writer David Alabahari, she edited and published books with literary contributions by authors from the entire region (Albahari Cultural Center). She translates literature for numerous publishing houses (Booka, Bulevar Books…) and is a member of the Association of Literary Translators of Serbia. She is a communications and media consultant at the Cultural Center of Belgrade.
Zoran Janković, film and literary critic and essayist, was born in Loznica in 1973. He graduated in English language and literature at the Faculty of Philology in Novi Sad. He writes film reviews and texts from art and culture for the Vreme weekly and the Optimist magazine. He is a correspondent for the pan-European film and guild portal Film New Europe. Together with Đorđe Bajić, he is the creator of the traveling film workshop How to Watch a Film. He is the co-editor and journalist of the film magazine Vidimo se u bioskopu (See you at the movies) under the auspices of the Network of Cinema Screeners of Serbia, whose portal he also edits. Bajić and Janković are the authors of the film podcast Filmaholic and film forums Gnevni filmovi (Angry movies). He co-authored the books Critical Guide to Serbian Film 2000-2017 and The Best Serbian Films of the 21st Century. Together with Bajić, he is the author of the book Critical Guide to Serbian Film 2018-2022. Those three books preceded a collection of essays on film themes, Novi kadrovi – Skrajnuti fenomeni srpskog filma published by Clio from Belgrade. He is also engaged in literary translation.
Photo: Ema Bednarž
TEEN jury
Isidora Cvetković is 18-year-old student of XIII Belgrade gymnasium. With a wide range of interests, especially in world politics and photography, she actively participates in extracurricular activities, which allows her to develop skills outside of the standard curriculum. Her passion for international topics leads her to a desire to study international relations, and she plans to do so by studying abroad. In addition to her academic goals, Isidora enjoys creative projects and artistic expression through her lens.
Iva Gošnjak is 17 years old and lives in Belgrade, where she attends the XIII Belgrade gymnasium. She has been acting as an amateur in a drama studio for ten years, and she also worked on producing the amateur play Zapisi iz podzemlja (Notes from the Underground). In addition, since this year, she has been part of the organization of the “Prepad” youth art festival. She is interested in various aspects of film and theater arts and plans to work in cultural management.
Rade Mirković was born in 2007 in Belgrade, where he still lives. He is a third-year student at XIII Belgrade gymnasium. He is the author and director of the amateur play Zapisi iz podzemlja (Notes from the Underground) and has been organizing the youth art festival ‘’Prepad’’ since this year. He is interested in theater direction, literature, and film.
Sofija Sofrenić is a fourth-year XIII Belgrade gymnasium student who plans to enroll in architecture studies. She is engaged in painting and has been going to the art studio of the Children’s Cultural Center of Belgrade since she was little. This year, she had an independent retrospective exhibition there. She won numerous awards at international art competitions. She used to dance and enjoys learning foreign languages, especially French.
olivera ranđić award
Devoted. Curious. Open. Clever. Creative. Witty. Brave. Reliable. Gentle. Imaginative. Persistent. Unique.
These were all traits of Olivera Ranđić, the coordinator and spiritus movens of the Free Zone junior program, who we lost prematurely in December of 2022. In memory of Olja and her remarkable work, the B92 Fund and the Free Zone Film Festival are introducing the “Olivera Ranđić” award for the most creative contributions in (in)formal education, for innovations and bravery in introducing new methods and tools in teaching the fields of human rights and the humanities, while encouraging the collaboration between educational institutions and non-governmental organizations.
With this award we seek to give credit to both our beloved Olja and similar good-spirited people in education, be it those working within the system or outside it, those who are moving things forward in one of the most important areas of life and strive to make it interesting and important to young people. To those who selflessly work towards the substantial progress of our society through the promotion of knowledge, understanding, and openness, we say this – many of us appreciate your passion and contribution, do not give up. Our beloved Olja never did either, because she understood the importance of what she was doing.
Thanks to her persistence, dedication, and creativity, the program of the B92 Fund, Free Zone Junior, for more than 15 years led and developed, started a conversation in the education system in Serbia about the development of solidarity, understanding, activism and expanded knowledge about important social topics using engaged movies in the classroom. Junior today includes numerous activities in elementary schools, high schools, and higher education, as well as extracurricular programs for high school students.
By creating this award, among other things, Olja’s colleagues and friends will continue her work and encourage others to continue to contribute to this important field with enthusiasm and belief in the essential importance of improving education through the use of innovative and creative tools.
