The Rotterdam International Film Festival will take place from January 22nd to February 2nd, 2020, and several new Serbian films and Serbian co-productions will be featured on the program, in several sections.

My Morning Laughter, the debut feature by writer and director Marko Đorđević, will be shown in the official program Bright Future, a program unit focused on current first or second films in the career of directors and directors from all over the worldd. It is the international premiere of this film, and this is happening after notable festival performances in our country and as many as three major festival awards in just two weeks (awards at the Belgrade Auteur Film Festival, Pančevo Film Festival and Šumadija International Film Festivals in Kragujevac) and a few very special screenings.

My morning laughter is a story of the late blooming of 30-year-old Dejan who finally loses his virginity. All of this, in a broad sense, is about a generation that grew up over-protected and whose parents were trying to keep their children away from the harsh reality. Now that parents have lost their dignity and strength and when families start to collapse, their children, already adults, finally have to take up responsibility and face life.

The screenwriter is Marko Đorđević, who is also the director and the editor. The film was produced by  Miloš Pušić, the DOP is Stefan Milosavljević, the costumes by Lila Vuković and set design by Marija Kojić; the sound design is by Stevan Milošević, and sound editing by Boris Zaborski and Prvoslav Živanović, sound mix by Kostas Fylaktidis and color correction by Eszter Nagy. The film stars Filip Đurić, su Jasna Đuričić and Ivana Vuković, with Nebojša Glogovac playing one of his final film roles. The film also stars Bratislav Slavković, Stefan Trifunović, Momčilo Simić, Snežana Tatalović, Sonja Isailović and others.

The world premiere of Mladen Kovačević’s new documentary Merry Christmas, Yiwu! is to take place in the same programme. This  intimate film about everyday Chinese workers, caught between communist traditions and the newly-established Chinese dream of success, takes us to Yiva, a city with 600 factories of Christmas decorations that produce Christmas for the whole world. The writer and director is Mladen Kovačević, the  producers are Iva Plemić Divjak, Mario Adamson and Ruth Reid, and the co-producers are Jasmina Sijeričić, Haino Deckert and Thierry Detey. The editor is Jelena Maksimović, the director of photography Marko Milovanovič. The composer is Olof Dreijer. Patrick Stromdal was responsible for sound design and mix, and the assistant for sound post-production was Pavle Kovačević.

As part of the Perspectives of the Future programme , the 49th Rotterdam International Film Festival will host the documentary Occupied Cinema directed by Senka Domanović.

The Makavejev Case or Trial in the Movie Theater by Goran Radovanović will also be screened as a part of Deep Focus and Regained sections.

That’s not all – and the Turkish-Serbian film The Potential Candidate will have its world premiere at the Festival as part of the Voices competition program. Screenwriter, lead actor and film director is Ercan Kesal, a Turkish writer, actor and film director. Kesal began working as an actor and screenwriter in Nuri Bilga Ceylan’s films. The film is co-produced by Serbian production companies Thalia Production and Living Pictures.

The synopsis reveals the following… Kemal wants to become mayor. He prepares a festive dinner in the hopes that the party president will declare him a candidate. But Kemal rejects the vision of himself as a conscientious and helpful doctor with high ideals during the evening and faces the truth that violence, envy and blind ambition are rooted in every human being.

All mentioned films were supported by Film Center Serbia (FCS). In addition, the accompanying program Perspective 49 of the Rotterdam International Film Festival will feature the short film Dreamland by Canadian author Alan Brown, produced as part of the residency program Alternative Film / Video in Belgrade, organized by the Student Film City Academic Film Center in New Belgrade. Dreamland is an unusual experimental journey, through oneiric images taken in Serbia that were skillfully edited and intertwined with film recorded in Morthern Canada (Canadian Shield area), accompanied by hypnotic and paranoid audio frequencies.27