Take Me Somewhere Nice 2019

Directed by Ena Sendijarevic

Winner of the Special Jury Prize at Rotterdam, this delightfully absurdist road movie channels Jarmusch and Kaurismäki in telling the story of a young woman visiting Bosnia to find her estranged father.

Bosnia and Herzegovina / The Netherlands In Bosnian and Dutch with English subtitles
91 minutes DCP
M
violence, drug use & sex scenes

Director/Screenplay

Producers

Iris Otten
,
Sander van Meurs
,
Pieter Kuijpers

Photography

Emo Weemhoff

Editor

Lot Rossmark

Production designer

Myrte Beltman

Costume designer

Nedda Nagel

Music

Ella van der Woude

With

Sara Luna Zorić (Alma)
,
Lazar Dragojević (Denis)
,
Ernad Prnjavorac (Emir)
,
Sanja Burić (mother)
,
Jasna Đuričić (club singer Jovana)
,
Mario Knezović (politician)
,
Emir Hadžihafızbegović (magician)

Festivals

Rotterdam
,
Cannes (ACID) 2019

Awards

Special Jury Prize, Rotterdam International Film Festival 2019

Elsewhere

A Dutch-raised Bosnian teen finds herself a stranger in a strange land when she returns to her homeland in this stylishly off-kilter coming-of-age flick turned road movie. Ena Sendijarević’s debut feature delivers the same deadpan joy as her excellent short film Import (NZIFF17).

Upon learning that her long absent father has been hospitalised, Alma (Sara Luna Zorić) decides to travel to Bosnia to find him before it’s too late. When she arrives in Sarajevo without much of a clue, Alma’s shady black-market dealing cousin Emir gives her a frosty reception and refuses to help. A dye-job gives her a new look, but a busted suitcase leaves her stuck with the summer dress she arrived in. After a brief flirtation with Emir’s goofball ‘intern’ Denis, Alma decides to strike out on her own.

Unashamedly influenced by the likes of Jim Jarmusch and Aki Kaurismäki, Sendijarević takes Alma on an amusing and absurdist journey through the Balkan countryside. Beautifully shot in a boxy Academy ratio with an eye for quirky and colourful composition, Take Me Somewhere Nice consistently surprises and marks Sendijarević as a young filmmaker to watch. — MM

“To come of age is to be neither young nor old. To be Dutch or Bosnian, to be native or immigrant, to be citizen or nomad: adolescent uncertainty is twisted and stressed through these complex cultural affiliations… Alma is at the edge of womanhood, gazing into a fractured world that reflects – what else? – a fractured self… Playful, delightful Take Me Somewhere Nice frames and articulates this spatial and psychological confusion.” — Joseph Owen, The Playlist