Zana

Beautiful touching movie exploring PTSD and the crimes that happened in Kosovo. Amazing performances by the lead and the man who played her husband, you can't help but feel for these characters. Makes you grateful and thankful if you are one who have never had to experience the crimes of war and understand what those who went through this time dealt with.

Zana is a powerful film from Antoneta Kastrati, director whose films need to be followed. Few war inspired films nowadays are able to escape the unnecessary melodrama and a approach that basically forces the audiences into feeling sorry for the victims. Zana is not one of those films. Starting from masterful acting by the best of Kosovo's acting community, to an elaborate and powerful cinematography, and the haunting sound score, Zana feels like matured and precise filmmaking, which is surprising considering Zana is the first feature film by Kastrati. Using the Kosovo war as a backdrop to the story, Zana in essence speaks about the pressure of patriarchal values against the female protagonist. This is un-mistakenly a personal film for Kastrati, as she informs at the end credits that her mother and sister were victims of the Kosovo war. Her previous films, short and docs, all dealt directly and indirectly with effects of the conflict. Zana is a culmination of those efforts, professionally and masterfully put together by a wide team of talented professionals. Because it is personal, Kastrati, through the subtle yet emotional performance of Adriana Matoshi, puts us inside the head of the female protagonist. Other actors also very good at providing a picture and emotions of living a village life, with all the challenges, cries, laughter and every day monotony and suffering in a village struck by the devastation of a war. However, this is by far a personal story of the female protagonist, and the entire film and her world is viewed from her perspective entirely. In addition to being informative on personal effects of the Kosovo war, and how women continue to be perpetual victims of it to this day, Zana feels cathartic. I was honored to see the film in its premiere in Prishtina. The audience was shaken to the core, barely able to give an applause to the present film team afterwards. There were people crying and shaken in the corridors, a testament to the sincerity and strength of this film. The acting play of the local healer, played incredibly by one of the best actors in Kosovo is Mensur Safqiu is a performance worth of multiple awards and is timeless in its nature. Another aspect of the film is very personal and beautiful cinematography, which allowed actors to show their skills and haunting locations to show their strength. And finally, the sound and music composed (Albanian-German band Andrra) adds the necessary emotional layer to the film, without being "in your face" too much. All in all, Zana can be easily said to be the best and most powerful of Kosovo's cinema, putting Kastrati firmly into the generation who will lead the New Kosovo Cinema Wave. A must see film for everyone.

Heartbreaking movie! Nothing better than this Movies shows the postwar traumatic lives , mixed with tradition! The main Role , Lume , she plays in a perfect way! A solid 10/10!

Zana weaves a tale set in the aftermath of the Kosovo war but transcends time, politics. and geography. It is a stunning portrayal of the depths and nuances of trauma and grief. The external constraints of an overtly patriarchal society serve as both a literal telling of a grieving woman's alienation and entrapment while also metaphorically capturing the inescapability of pervasive grief. It haunts and possesses its host. Lume, the protagonist in Zana, portrayed exquisitely by Adriana Matoshi, struggles to exist after unthinkable loss (no spoilers), but her real battle registers more so as a battle against others' expectations of her than her own inherent desire to "move on." She does not seek to move on. She does not seek to fully integrate in this new world that proceeds without her loved one. Anyone who has experienced loss can relate to this, the discomfort that others carry and project. Their well meaning wishes butting up against the rebellious longing to hold on, to preserve the relevance and value of the deceased. Zana uses culturally significant devices and context specific to Kosovo (witch doctors, animals, war) to render both an historically accurate depiction but also incredibly subtle metaphors that pack visceral punches. This is not a fast film, there are so many moments of noticing - stunning landscapes, skin texture, complex emotions dancing behind the eyes of the characters. Levity breaks through at just the right moments, as in real life, it's never all drama...survival requires and manufactures lightness and laughter. With Zana, her first feature length film, director Antoneta Kastrati is brave, not just in funneling her own personal loss into storytelling (she lost her mother and sister in the war), not just in trusting that a female protagonist's gut churning journey is enough to carry the film, but in allowing Lume to win in the most unexpected way and on her own terms.

This movie brilliantly deals with war traumas, but in a new, peaceful, environment. At least peaceful on the outside. You will definitely learn what it feels like to lose a child, by gun violence, in front of your eyes and being expected to live a normal live after that. You'll learn how this turns to what the villagers would describe as "black magic", and the doctors as hallucinations (etc.) because of severe PTSD. You'll get a reassurance that this could happen in real life, because it ACTUALLY IS based on real life events. You get to see how "witchcraft" only makes thing worse and how things could have gone better for the characters' lives, if psychiatrists were involved. You also get to see some albanian culture touch about the way albanian societies and families function, especially how they used to function immediately post-war. You also get to feel SO much emotion, just wait for the end...