“Winter / Miracle”, a docuficion allegory by Željka Sukova and Brasilian director Gustavo Beck (Croatia, Dennmark, Brasil, 2012: production: Udruga UKUS, DOX:LAB, If you hold a stone) won the Best Central and Eastern European Documentary Film award at the 17th Jihlava International Documentary Film Festival in the Czech Republic.

The decision of the jury, consisted of Dudley Andrew, Lordan Zafranović, Gwenaël Breës and Özge Calafato, was announced on October 28th 2013.

Statement of the jury:

“Our Best Film award goes to a work that pushes the boundaries of genres to reach for new realms of cinematic experience, at once sensual and iconoclastic. This film defies all norms of production in order to speak with artistic freedom about a social freedom to come. We salute Željka Suková and Gustavo Beck for having struggled together to create Winter I Miracle, a film whose exuberant geography and more exuberant cinematography should invigorate all of us in Jihlava as spectators and as artists. Long live Jihlava.”

The largest and the most significant documentary film festival in this part of Europe took place between 24th and 29th October 2013. In addition to the main section Between the Seas, which presented documentaries from Central and Eastern Europe, the audience could also see international innovative documentaries in the section Opus Bonum, an overview of the new Czech films in the section Czech Joy, and the best experimental documentaries in the section Fascinations.

Members of the Association UKUS were also invited to participate in Inspiration Forum, a part of the Industry program of the festival. Producer Ales Suk and director Željko Suková, accompanied with other elected directors from around the world who are currently “in focus” of a documentary film and with significant persons who are not part of the film industry (writers, publicists, activists), were discussing and searching for new topics in documentary.