Film Archive

Unwanted

East of the West - Competition 2017 / T’padashtun / Kosovo, Netherlands 2017

Teenager Alban lives in Amsterdam with his mother Zana, who left Kosovo during the war in the Balkans. When he starts going out with the sensitive Ana, neither of them has any idea that unresolved injustices and shadows from the past will make their way to the surface. This insightful, mature debut by a Kosovan director reminds us how difficult forgiveness and reconciliation can be.

Synopsis

Teenager Alban lives in Amsterdam with his mother Zana, who left Kosovo during the war in the Balkans and no longer has any contact with her family back home. A troublemaker at school, Alban doesn’t really fit in with his classmates; he’s an aggressive loner but also a dreamer who prefers just to hang about town. When he starts going out with the perceptive Ana, things start to look up. But then clouds begin to gather over the young couple’s sincere romance, casting shadows of their parents’ unresolved past that can still cause pain even twenty years later and in an entirely different country. Visually compelling, the story is told linearly while highlighting the simplicity, even impassivity, of the city and its surroundings in which the drama of a handful of people unfolds. Each individual carries his or her own secrets and injustices. The director allows the viewer gradually to see inside his characters, thus increasing the tension and ambiguity of their behaviour. This mature debut by a talented filmmaker reminds us that it’s impossible to escape painful experiences and that forgiveness and reconciliation are difficult to attain.

Ivana Novotná

About the film

85 min / Color, DCP
World premiere
Director Edon Rizvanolli / Screenplay Edon Rizvanolli / Dir. of Photography Danny Noordanus / Editor Edon Rizvanolli / Art Director Leonora Mehmeti, Pavle Mihalic / Producer Edon Rizvanolli / Production Asfaltfilms / Coproduction 1244 Productions, De Productie / Cast Adriana Matoshi, Jason de Ridder, Niki Verkaar / Contact Asfaltfilms

About the director

Edon Rizvanolli (b. 1972, Pristina, Kosovo, Yugoslavia) began his acting career in Austria in 1992. He also studied acting for two years at the Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute in New York. In 1998 he shot his first short experimental film Blownaway, which was followed by the award-winning documentary Shuffle – Politics, Bullshit and Rock ’n’ Roll (Shuffle – Politike, laknurë dhe rokenroll), covering the alternative music scene in Pristina. He has lived in Amsterdam since 2007, where he works as an actor, director and film editor. Unwanted is his feature film debut, screened at Karlovy Vary in its world premiere.