Heartrending Story of Emancipation of a Young Woman: Zhaleika in Fresh Danube Films Selection

Cinema City from June 25 to July 2 in Novi Sad

This year’s Fresh Danube Films Section will once again bring a great selection of debut and follow-up productions from the Danube region picked and chosen by Vladan Petković. Within this program, we present the winner of the Grand Prix Award at the most important Bulgarian film festival in Sofia – Eliza Petkova’s film Zhaleika, which also won the Special Mention Award at this year's Berlinale.

Zhaleika is a narrative about a young girl striving to live her life her own way and by the rules contrary to the tradition and customs of her community, a struggle treated with contempt both by her family and by the other residents of her small village in Bulgaria. “Debutant director Eliza Petkova exploits the conflict between a not-so-modern teenage girl and the tradition and customs of a stagnating Bulgarian village, to illustrate the civilizational discrepancies triggered by modern technology,” selector Petković says.

Eliza Petkova is the author of several movies successfully presented at festivals around the world. Her short film Absent made it to the 2015 Cinéfondation program at the Cannes Film Festival. Zhaleika is her first full-length production.

Don’t miss out the groundbreaking cinematic accomplishments of the Fresh Danube Films section!

#CinemaCity2016 @ Creative Quarter

See you.