– This is the first big award that this film has received and that’s why it will always be my favourite one – said the director, thanking the audience, organizers and the jury.

“Cycles” is the story about the dramatic life and the struggle of a young Joško Morović, whose studying photography and film-making is stopped by the testicle cancer that spreads to the lungs. The title of the documentary is based on the six cycles that the hero of Gojun’s film has to go through to fight the malignant disease. The way that the author approached to his main character, and a friend at the same time, was crucial for the jury, consisted of the three ladies, Rada Šešić, Ibtisam Mara’ana and Elma Tataragić, to give it the Grand Prix – Jack Daniels, the Crystal projector and provide him 3000 Euros for his further work.

-    After seeing all the films we have decided to give the first award to the documentary film “Cycles” that talks about the suffering of a young man, what the author showed in a very sophisticated way – the directress Elma Tataragić explained the jury’s decision.

The second award in amount of 1000 Euros and the Crystal projector went to the French-Algerian production “China is still far”, directed by Malek Bensmail. The documentary shows a small Algerian village lost in the mountains of Aures struck by the seven year war, and this strong film with interesting characters, as internationally recognized directress estimated it, gives the insight into survival in the society.

The audience also chose the best film. So, this year, the Audience award, 1000 Euros and the Crystal projector, went to Israeli film “Loving Sophia”, directed by Ohad Itach. It’s a powerful story about a girl who is a drug addict and a prostitute, the struggle of getting out of all of this and finding the possibility of moving forward.  

This year, on the initiative of the jury, a Special jury award was presented for the first time, and it went to the directress Laura Halilović for amiable film, “Me, my Gipsy family and Woody Allen”.

-    We were impressed by the entire selection of the films, and the documentary made by Laura Halilović spiritedly approaches to a hard and serious subject, giving it intimacy and personal imprint, what initiated us to think of this special award, said Elma Tataragić.

Before the award ceremony of the 11th Mediterranean Film Festival, where 21 documentaries was screened in the competition program, the audience had the chance to see the first film of the film workshop, which was organized for the first time. “Desilo happened” is the title of the film, and is a story about the archaeologist Snježana Vasilj who is engaged in the preservation of the amphora site at Hutovo blato. The story was thought out, shot and edited by twelve attendants in this four-day workshop.

The lecturers, from whom these future directors had the chance to learn from, were Vlatko Filipović and Zdravko Mustać, and the member of the jury Rada Šešić, with Antoni Ćorić and Tomislav Bubalo, who were the mentors of the film workshop.