INTERNATIONAL JURY PRESIDENT

Vinko Brešan was born in Zagreb in 1964. He studied comparative literature and philosophy at the Faculty of Philosophy and Film and TV directing at the Academy of Dramatic Arts in Zagreb. In 1994 and 1995, he won the Octavian Awards at the Croatian Film Days for the short documentaries Joint Lunch and Hallway. His debut, low-budget, feature film How the War Started on My Island is, after Titanic, the most watched feature film in Croatian cinemas since 1990. The films Marshal and Witnesses were awarded at the festivals in Berlin and Karlovy Vary, and the fourth feature film It's Not the End won the FIPRESCI Critics' Award in Karlovy Vary. The film The Priest's Children is the most watched Croatian film in the 21st century, and was nominated for the European Film Academy Award. His sixth feature film What a Country! was seen by over 60,000 spectators in Croatian cinemas, and was declared the best film at the Serbian National Festival in Sopot, and became the first film to win the festival as a minority co-production. He also won the Audience Award at the Thessaloniki Film Festival. He also directs in the theater. His play Slap by Nenad Stazić won the Days of Satire in Zagreb in 1999, and Scents, Gold and Incense were declared a cultural event of the Rijeka Summer Evenings in 2005. The play Hamlet in the village of Mrduša donja by Ivo Brešan, directed by him, was the winner of Days of Satire in 2014. The play How the War Started on My Island by Ivo and Vinko Brešan won the Audience Award at the Marulić Days in 2019. He has been the director of the Zagreb Film Institution since 2007.

Ivica Dlesk was born in 1967, he graduated from the Faculty of Philosophy in Zagreb. He started making films in the early 2000s. Author of numerous documentaries and series, scientific and educational shows (Founders of Church Orders, The Story of Eva Schwarz, Man and His Shadow, Alfi Kabiljo - the world is mine, etc.). He works as an editor at the Documentary Program of Croatian television.  

Emiliano Dante (L'Aquila, Italy, 1974) is an independent film director. He came to cinema after a multifarious artistic pathway which includes painting, writing, theatre and music. He debuted as a director in 2003 with the series of shorts The Home Sequence Series, which focuses on the physical and symbolic places of his home. After other shorts, he made the trilogy of the documentaries about life after the earthquake in L'Aquila,  Into the Blue (2009),  Habitat – Personal Notes  (2014) and Apennine (2017). He also directed two fiction features,  Limen (2012) and Coins (in postproduction).

Branka Bešević Gajić is the award-winning Film & TV Director and Creative Producer. She holds a Master’s degree in Drama and Audiovisual arts, and has graduated in the class of professor Goran Pekovic, at Faculty of Dramatic Arts in Belgrade. At the moment she is a PhD student of Digital arts at University of Arts in Belgrade. She was born in Pancevo on September 18 th, 1982. In 2014 she debuted as director and screenwriter of film Lauš, a film about the life of the famous Yugoslav actor Zarko Lausevic. After a successful premiere at Sava Center in the Belgrade, the film was widely distributed in Serbia as well as in the Balkan region, followed by screenings at series of festivals in America, Australia, South Africa, Russia and China where it won numerous awards for directing, artistic contribution and courage of the author. 

Born in Argentina, of Italian family, Alexandre Valenti lives in France since 1977. He is a film maker, author, director, and film producer. He began his career as a freelance photographer and TV reporter. He has covered major geopolitical, economic, and social events in Europe, Latin America, Africa, and the Middle East. Now as an internationally renowned documentary filmmaker, he has travelled the world and worked on several award-winning films. Since the birth of Canal + France, he has collaborated with most of the major French public television documentary programs and major international TV co-productions. His last film Disposable Lives was awarded with the “Special Prize of the Jury “at the 23rd CINE-PE Film Festival in Recife, Brasil 2019. He wrote, filmed and directed The Maestros of the Camps , awarded and broadcasted worldwide. His documentary Argentina: The 500 stolen babies of the dictatorship won the FIPA Gold and the European Youth Prize at the 26th FIPA, as well as the Grand Prix and the Audience Prize at the 20th FIGRA as well as a Special PRIX EUROPE Prize 2013 in Berlin. Those two films have also been awarded at two editions of History Film Festival.