Apart from being selected as the Croatian contender for the Oscar Award, a few days ago, the Filmmakers Association of Croatia also selected is as Croatia’s contender for the Goya Awards of the Academy of Cinematographic Arts and Sciences of Spain, in the Best European Film category.

Fiume o morte! has become the most watched domestic documentary in national cinema distribution since Croatia’s statehood. In addition, Rijeka’s Art-kino Croatia officials stated that it is the most watched film in the history of that cinema. Based to the latest data, Fiume o morte! has been seen by more than 35 thousand viewers.

Fiume o morte! had its world premiere at the prestigious International Film Festival Rotterdam, where it won the festival’s main Tiger award and the FIPRESCI prize. Since then, it has travelled the world from Australia, across Taiwan, all the way to Mexico, screening at New York’s MoMA, being selected for as many as 35 festivals around the world, winning numerous awards, and being awarded best documentary at festivals in Innsbruck, Podgorica, and Erevan. It also took home as many as six Golden Arenas at this year’s Pula Film Festival – for make-up, costume design, set design, casting, production and direction, as well as the annual Vedran Šamanović Award honouring pushing the boundaries of filmmaking. Some of the latest accolades include the award for best film in the Newcomers competition at the recently concluded MakeDox, and being selected as the best documentary at this year’s Vukovar Film Festival.

Moreover, ICA Cinema recently acquired distribution rights for the documentary for screening in the United Kingdom and Ireland.

The award-winning author, Igor Bezinović, (winner of the Grand Golden Arena in 2017 for his fiction feature A Brief Excursion) examines the consequences of the occupation on the city itself and its residents in a highly creative way. In order to find answers, the filmmaker gets the residents of Rijeka, which the Italians call Fiume, to recount, reconstruct, and reinterpret the bizarre story of the 16-month long occupation of their city in 1919 by the Italian poet, dandy, and war advocate, Gabriele D’Annunzio.

The film was produced by Restart, with producers Vanja Jambrović and Tibor Keser, in co-production with companies Nosorogi from Slovenia (co-produced Marina Gumzi) and Videomante from Italy (co-produced Erica Barbiani).

This year, the committee of the Filmmakers Association of Croatia chose between six submitted features: Wrath of God by Kristijan Milić, Fiume o Morte! by Igor Bezinović, Trouble by Svebor Mihael Jelić, The Lost Dream Team by Jure Pavlović, Celebration by Bruno Anković and Sandbag Dam by Čejen Černić Čanak.