Starigrad Paklenica, Croatia, Hosts World’s First Music Documentary Film Festival
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This year, for seven days in August, in Starigrad Paklenica in Dalmatia, North Croatia, the first ever festival of music documentaries was held. This could well become an annual event.
Starigrad Paklenica is one of the most unlikely places to hold a film festival – the town is no more than a ribbon of campsites, guesthouses, hotels and restaurants sandwiched between the Adriatic and the mountains. Stranger still, there are no cinemas but that doesn’t stop the resourceful Croatians. They set up two open-air screening venues just inside the National Park and also erect a stage by the sea. Every evening, for a week, they show up to five music documentaries, with a rock concert in between.
The festival opened with speeches from the organizers and local dignitaries, with simultaneous translation into English and was then followed by live music from TBF, The Beat Fleet. They’re one of Croatia’s most innovative bands and their brand of trip-hop worked well in the open air, though my grasp of the language didn't quite stretch to understanding the lyrics.
The festival’s opening film, “How the Beatles Rocked the Kremlin”, started at midnight and we all trekked up to the Mala Paklenica canyon to view it under the stars. It’s a British film, directed by Leslie Woodhead, and he was there to say a few words. The documentary is about how the music of the Beatles influenced young Russians even though it was officially banned under communism and it was particularly appropriate here in former Yugoslavia. Of course Croatians didn’t really have the same restrictions as Italian radio was widely available and they could easily nip over the border to Trieste to buy their records, but it did strike a chord.
Joy Division, Leonard Cohen and Beethoven were the subjects of other films and there was a commendable selection of documentaries from Serbia, Slovenia and Croatia, as well as performances from local bands. It’s strange that it’s taken so long to hold a festival of music films but it seems that Starigrad Paklenica is firmly on the movie map.
Useful links
Croatian National Tourist Office – 0208 563 7979
Hotel Alan offers inclusive accomodation by the sea
Hotel Rajna has just 10 comfortable rooms and serves great food
Starigrad Paklenica Film Festival
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