Sarajevo Film Festival

The festival began while the city was still under siege. In 1995, towards the end of the four-year siege of Sarajevo, the Obala Art Centar started the Sarajevo Film Festival to help rebuild civil society and keep the city's cosmopolitan spirit alive. Three decades on it is the leading film festival of South-East Europe, with a paying audience of over 100,000 on top of film professionals and press.

The 32nd edition ran from 14 to 21 August 2026. It opened on a Friday with a ceremony at the National Theatre and Pawel Pawlikowski's film Fatherland. The core is the Heart of Sarajevo competition, which in 2026 had four sections: feature fiction, feature-length and short documentaries, short fiction and student short films. Beside it sit programmes for children and teenagers, tributes, and music events. Asghar Farhadi received the Honorary Heart of Sarajevo that year, and Emily Watson was jury president for the feature competition.

The festival's focus is South-East Europe, so many of the films come from the region and are hard to see elsewhere. It also runs an industry side, CineLink, for filmmakers and producers.

How to go. The festival centre is at the Bosnian Cultural Centre (BKC), where the box office is. Tickets are collected there no later than the day before the screening, between 11:00 and 17:00, and you need the ticket with you at the screening. The Sarajevo guide below covers the city around the festival.