'Three Kilometers to the End of the World' wins top award at Sarajevo Film Festival

The film won the Heart of Sarajevo prize for Best Feature Film at the Sarajevo Film Festival.

The jury, led by U.S. writer-director Paul Schrader ("First Reformed") and including Swedish actor and producer Noomi Rapace ("Lamb"), Finnish director-writer Juho Kuosmanen ("Compartment No. 6"), Sarajevo-born, Paris-based director, writer, and editor Una Gunjak ("Excursion"), and Slovenian actor Sebastian Cavazza ("Men Don't Cry"), awarded the actor-turned-director's third feature.

""Three Kilometers," which follows a 17-year-old who's the victim of a homophobic attack in a small town in Romania's Danube Delta, examines the assault's fallout on his rural community from multiple perspectives," according to Variety.

Yorgos Zois won best director for his fantasy-drama "Arcadia," which premiered in the Encounters section of the Berlin Film Festival. The film follows Katerina, a talented neurologist played by Greek star Angeliki Papoulia ("Dogtooth," "The Lobster"), and her husband, Yannis (Vangelis Mourikis), a once-respected doctor, as they are tasked with identifying the deceased of a fatal automobile accident in an off-season coastal resort. Once there, Katerina is compelled to confront her worst fears while making unexplained nightly visits to the titular seaside tavern.

Anab Ahmed Ibrahim received the prize for best actress for her role in filmmaker Mo Harawe's 'The Village Next to Paradise', which was the first picture from Somalia to show on the Croisette when it premiered in Cannes' Un Certain Regard section this year. Ibrahim plays a lady attempting to live on her own terms after a marriage ended due to infertility in what Variety's Murtada Elfadl describes as Harawe's "poised" and "confident" debut.

Best actor honors went to Doru Bem for his lead role in Andrei Cohn's "Holy Week," a historical drama about the endless cycle of bloodshed in a 19th-century Romanian village. Bem plays a Jewish man named Leiba who runs the village inn, a meeting point for Christians and Jews alike, although the conviviality masks racism and antisemitism, reported Variety. (ANI)