T he Küstendorf International Film and Music Festival is one of the rare festi- vals around the world at which the ex- change of energy between young and experienced artists can be seen at every step. Festival hosts celebrated authors, actors and musicians, but also students of film schools from around the world, as well as other eminent guests from the world of film. Küstendorf has to date hosted renowned di- rectors, actors and musicians that include the likes of Paolo Sorrentino, Matt Dillon, Lav Diaz, Nikita Mikhalkov, Johnny Depp, Jim Jarmusch, Audrey Tautou, Gael García Bernal, Monica Bellucci, An- drei Konchalovsky and many others. Thanks to its exceptional atmosphere, the festival has – accord- ing to Moviemaker, one of the U.S.’s most popu- lar film portals – ranked three times among the best festivals in the world, as selected by renowned workers from the film industry: screenwriters, di- rectors, producers and critics. The stage has been set, literally, on the snow-cov- ered hill in the wooden town of Drvengrad that was built by Emir Kusturica for his film Life Is a Miracle (2004), and he subsequently added rooms created in the style of mountain chalets, restaurants, bars, cinemas and various unusual structures. The fes- tival sees filmmakers, hailing from as far afield as China and Iceland, present their new works, while nightly concerts resound into the early hours of the morning. Surrounded by forested hills, Drvengrad represents a wonderful base for winter fun, with- out major crowds. There everything is coloured by film, especially in mid-January, so you can encoun- ter celebrities strolling along Ivo Andrić Street and Nikola Tesla Square or drinking hot rakija brandy in the Ćorkan’s Place tavern... Interestingly, it was a year ago that Mokra Gora [meaning Wet Mountain in English] was declared the world’s best tourist village! It was selected among more than 170 competitors from 75 countries at the session of the General Assembly of the United Nations World Tourism Organization in Madrid. According to Kusturica himself, Mokra Gora de- serves this recognition because a home has been built in this location that is visited by many more people than anyone could even have imagined at the outset, and it is a place where individuals and the state have succeeded in complementing the whole, which, according to him, now needs the ad- dition of decorations. Located between the mountains of Tara and Zlatibor, there are so many truly amazing things for you to discover in this part of Serbia – even if you don’t come because of your love of films.
Scena je postavljena, bukvalno, na snegom prekrivenom brdu u drvenom selu Drvengrad, koje je podigao Emir Kusturica za svoj film „Život je čudo“ The stage has been set, literally, on the snow-covered hill in the wooden town of Drvengrad that was built by Emir Kusturica for his film Life Is a Miracle
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