The Kids Fest children’s film festival, taking place in several cities across the country, was founded in 2004 as first Serbian film event focusing on children, with a programme targeting different age groups – 4-year-olds, young teenagers, and everything in between. Kids Fest took the opportunity to look for like-minded partners in Europe in the Open Mic sessions during the ECFA AGM. And they hereby repeat their call.
Scheduled every year in October in the four largest cities in Serbia, the festival films afterwards start touring other locations around the country, as well as in Montenegro. Every festival edition comes with a theme, referring to specific events or trends in the region or the world, reflected not only in the films but also in the workshops. “Every year we have workshops on topics such as language, plants and animals, comic books, board games, astronomy, screen printing, etc. These are organized in partnership with different institutions such as the French Cultural Institute, the Museum of African Art, the Centre for Promotion of Science, etc.,” says Milica Joksimovic. “In the future we would like to focus more on authentic film education – workshops and talks connected to specific films. We’d like to include interactive elements, and have workshops focusing on the art of cinema in general.” Informal film education in Serbia is tailored towards high school students, with film criticism as well as filmmaking workshops. While literature education starts quite early in schools, film education is almost non-existent. “That’s why we want to launch a network of European festivals through which we could exchange knowledge and different practices in film education for children. This would even allow kids to travel to festivals and meet their peers from other countries and learn about other cultures through film.”
This project is still in an early stage of development. Joksimovic: “For this year’s edition, we’re planning on building a detailed action plan as well as researching different financing options.” Everyone who wants to find out more or who can advise the Kids Fest team, please contact Milica Joksimovic at milica.joksimovic@mcf.rs.