These projects will compete for nine prizes amounting to 119,000 EUR in cash and in-kind, as well as invitations to IDFA, DOK Lepzig and Movies that Matter.

The Sarajevo Film Festival is rarely thought of as a place where you discover documentaries, but with constant developments of programmes that focus on documentaries exclusively or as part of the selection, more and more documentary filmmakers turn to it as a place to further develop their projects and meet possible partners.

This year, Srđan Šarenac’s Prison Beauty Contest is one of two documentaries presented at Work in Progress. The director follows three possible future beauty contest winners: Joyce (competing for Miss Spring), Angel (competing in Mister – transgender category) and Sueli (Competing for Miss Plus Size). The difference between them and other competitors is that they will have to take off their prison uniforms to get into beautiful dresses.

In second WiP project, Too Close directed by the Romanian Botond Pusok, Andrea (a single mother in her forties) is fighting to create a new life for herself and her children after she finds out that the father of her unborn son was abusing her little daughter throughout their relationship.

Five more projects will be presented as part of Docu Rough Cut Boutique, the development platform co-organised by the Balkan Documentary Centre and dedicated to documentaries in advanced editing.

These five projects range from stories about a young genius, in Atonal Glow by Alexandre Koridze, through looking for a new essence of a relationship that has lived through one member's illness, in Cent'anni by Maja Prelog, or the search for a way to connect a family after the death of the father, who used to shoot them with his camera, in My Dad’s Lessons by Dalija Dozet, to the story of lives trying to grow from landfill in Bottlemen by Nemanja Vojinović and the search for a different side of the lives of Bulgarian hooligans in No Place for You in Our Town by Nikolay Stefanov.

Docu Talents From the East is organised by the Ji.hlava International Documentary Film Festival and it showcases long creative documentary projects from Central and Eastern Europe which are in production or postproduction.

Andreiana Mihail’s Boxing with Myself follows the life and work of the Romanian visual artist Ion Grigorescu.

Comrades directed by Joanna Janikowska and One More Question by Mira Erdevicki tackle politics through personal stories. Janikowska shows three young Italians trying to work through the Communist Party to make a better world, but neither the Party nor the world is that easy to change. Erdevicki raises the question about the identity of post-Brexit Britain through the portraits of three empowered Roma, a lawyer, a policeman, and a student whose parents immigrated from Slovakia and the Czech Republic in the 90s.

Don’t Worry Sari! directed by Sári Haragonics and Snescha and Franz by Svetoslav Draganov are exploring the family dynamics. The first one is using dreams and archive footage to attempt a transgenerational psychotherapy, while Draganov is exploring the difference between individual wishes and common family whishes through the story of his aunt and uncle.

Directors Živilė Mičiulytė and Viktor Portel go behind the scenes to look for the truth in The Cabinet and The Investigator, respectively. They show journalists at work and an ex-war crime investigator going back to the places where the biggest war crimes he investigated happened.

All the 14 projects are in production or postproduction, lacking some funds to close the budgets, and looking for possible coproducers, partners and world sales.

The Sarajevo Film Festival is taking place 13-20 August 2021.

CineLinkWork in Progress:

Prison Beauty Contest (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Serbia)
Directed by Srđan Šarenac
Produced by Novi Film
Coproduced by Provid

Too Close (Romania)
Directed by Botond Pusok
Produced by Luna Film

DocuRoughCut Boutique:

Atonal Glow (Georgia)
Directed by Alexandre Koridze
Produced by Spark

Bottlemen (Serbia, Slovenia)
Directed by Nemanja Vojinović
Produced by Rt dobre Nade
Coproduced by Urgh! and Set Sail Films

Cent'anni (Slovenia, Poland, Italy)
Directed by Maja Prelog
Produced by Cvinger Film
Coproduced by Agresywna Banda, Zena Films

My Dad's Lessons (Croatia, Slovenia)
Directed by Dalija Dozet
Produced by Hulahop
Coproduced by December

No Place for You in Our Town (Bulgaria)
Directed by Nikolay Stefanov
Produced by Smarty Pants Shooter

DocuTalents from the East:

Freedom Squared (Russia)
Directed by Anastasia Zverkova
Produced by Salt Studio

Boxing With Myself (Romania)
Directed by Andreiana Mihail
Produced by Monogram Film

Comrades (Poland)
Directed by Joanna Janikowska
Produced by Kijora Film

Don’t Worry, Sari! (Hungary)
Directed by Sári Haragonics
Produced by Camp Film, Pi Productions

One More Question (Czech Republic)
Directed by Mira Erdevicki
Directed by Spring Pictures,
Coproduced by PubRes, Krutart

Snescha and Franz (Bulgaria, Austria)
Directed by Svetoslav Draganov
Produced by Cinaeste Maudit Production
Coproduced by Contrast Film

The Cabinet (Lithuania)
Directed by ŽivilėMičiulytė
Produced by Film Jam

The Investigator (Czech Republic, Croatia)
Directed by Viktor Portel
Produced by Frame Films, the Czech Television
Coproduced by Restart