Last films from the feature film competition before the award ceremony on Saturday: a touching Spanish film ‘20,000 Species of Bees’ and Icelandic ‘Solitude’ from the screenwriting workshop of the magnificent Rúnar Rúnarsson

ZFF Friday at CineStar Branimir brings us the last two films in the main competition program. At 6.30 PM we are screening 20,000 Species of Bees by Spanish director Estibaliz Urresola Solaguren, a touching coming of age story set in idyllic Basque country among beehives and honey, in which the lead part was played by Sofia Otero, who made history by becoming the youngest every Berlinale winner. The main competition program continues in CineStar Branimir at 9 PM with the new film written by Icelandic director Rúnar Rúnarsson, Solitude, directed by Ninna Pálmadóttir, an atypical story about loneliness and human connection.

Screening at Kinoteka Cinema starts at 2 PM with a film from the PLUS youth program Sea Sparkle, a story about growing up, loss, and healing which won special mention at Berlinale and won the European Children’s Film Association award. At 5 PM in Kinoteka Cinema, the Great 5 program continues with a new film from the Italian great Marco Bellochio, Kidnapped, a real story about a 19th century case when the Catholic Church kidnapped a Jewish boy which turned into a scandal and marked the beginning of the end of the Papal State. At 7.30 PM in Kinoteka, we have a film from the Together Again competition program and a new film by Croatian author Nevio Marasović, Good Times, Bad Times. The finale on Friday at Kinoteka Cinema starts at 10 PM with new films from the short film competition, Observation and Please Make It Work, as well as films from the Croatian short film program Checkers, The Real Truth About the Fight by Andrea Slaviček, Creepy Crawlies by Filip Zadro, and It’s Alright, It’s Nice by Luka Galešić.

ZFF Friday at MSU starts at 4 PM with the film from the children’s KinoKino program, Dancing Queen, about the 12-year-old Mina who might not know how to dance and lacks self-confidence, but that does not stop her from auditioning for the school dance group. The competition program Network of Festivals in the Adriatic Region screens Power at 6 PM at MSU. This dark political thriller by Mátyás Prikler is inspired by a true corruption scandal which shook Slovakia in 2009. Friday at MSU concludes at 8.30 PM with the film Opponent by Milad Alami which is in the running for the Golden Bicycle Award in the Together Again program.

Industry, a program dedicated to professionals, brings us two events on Friday: a Pitching forum for student projects where young screenwriters and directors will present their projects to an international panel and which will end the Industry Youth! Program. In cooperation with the Croatian Film Editors Society and Croatian Film Directors’ Guild, we will hold a masterclass by award-winning German editor Bettina Böhler, touted by the media as the incredible invisible woman of German cinema. Moderated by Iva Ivan, Bettina Böhler will talk about her work on films like Western and Afire, her rich film experiences, challenges for an editor, and continued collaborations with directors like Margarethe von Trotta, Valeska Grisebach, and Christian Petzold.