Director and actress Pegah Ahangarani, director Geregin Zakoyan, festival programmer and director Rada Šešić, director of photography Miloš Jaćimović, and journalist Nikola Marković are members of the jury for the documentary film competition program of the 39th Herceg Novi Film Festival – Montenegro Film Festival.
Pegah Ahangarani
Pegah Ahangarani is an award-winning Iranian director and actress. Her documentary film “Rehearsals for a Revolution” was part of the official selection of this year’s Cannes Film Festival, where it had its world premiere and won the “Golden Eye” award for Best Documentary Film.
Born in Iran in 1984, she currently lives and works in London, and her career spans more than three decades. As a director, she has made the documentary films “Trying to Remember” (IDFA 2021), “My Father” (IDFA 2023), “As I Die” (IDFA 2025), as well as the films “Child Soldier” (BBC World, 2024) and “Taraneh” (BBC World, 2025).
Her short films have received exceptional reviews and have been screened at numerous significant international festivals, including Hot Docs, Busan, IDA Documentary Awards, and the Melbourne International Film Festival. She has won awards at Dokufest (2021), Busan (2021), Porto Femme International Film Festival (2023, Gold Frame), IDFA (2023), Short Focus London Film Festival (2024), and Florence Short Film Festival (2024). Her works have also been published in “The New Yorker” magazine.
Geregin Zakoyan
Geregin Zakoyan is an Armenian film historian and theoretician, screenwriter, producer, and documentary film director, founder of the Armenian Cinematheque and the Apricot Tree festival.
Born in 1947, Zakoyan holds a PhD and is a professor at the Russian-Armenian (Slavonic) University. He is the founder and president of the NGO “Filmadaran,” as well as the founder and artistic director of the Apricot Tree International Documentary Film Festival.
He is the author of the books: “Armenian Silent Cinematography,” “Language and Film,” “Beyond Disappearance,” “The Color of Pomegranates: A Documentary History of Film,” “S. Parajanov: Letters from Prison,” “Armenian Cinematography: Materials and Documents (1909–1936),” “Armenian Cinematography: Materials and Documents (1937–1957),” “S. Parajanov: Intermezzo.”
His film works include: “Mignor,” “The Art of Prison,” “Kajaran: Metamorphosis of Stone,” “Patarag: Armenian Liturgy,” “Hamo Beknazarian: Monologue,” “Sergei Parajanov: Monologue,” “Lord, Give Us Freedom,” “Ayrudzi,” “Accused of Suicide,” “Andrei Bely: Armenia,” “Mon Reichshoffen,” and “Debed.”
He is a member of the Union of Cinematographers of Armenia, SACD (Society of Dramatic Authors and Composers, France), and FIPRESCI (International Federation of Film Critics).
Rada Šešić
Rada Šešić is a festival programmer, lecturer, critic, and director, a long-time selector for the world’s most significant documentary film festival, IDFA, and a selector for the Documentary Program at the Sarajevo Film Festival.
Born in former Yugoslavia, she currently lives and works in Utrecht, Netherlands. For more than two decades, she collaborated with IDFA Amsterdam in various capacities, including working on the selection committee, as a selector for the IDFA fund, and coordinating all juries. For 20 years, she has been a selector for the documentary program at the Sarajevo Film Festival, where she is a co-founder of Docu Rough Cut Boutique. She participates in the selection of projects for the Doha Film Institute, is the artistic director of the Last Stop Trieste program within WEMW in Italy, and a selector for the documentary program at the Trieste Film Festival. For two decades, she was a selector for South Asian cinema at IFF Rotterdam.
She teaches master’s film studies at the Netherlands Film Academy in Amsterdam and has also taught at the Netherlands Institute for Film Education (NIF). She is one of the founders of the Eastern Neighbours Film Festival in The Hague, where she served as artistic director for 15 years. She taught for one trimester at Srishti College in Bangalore and was a guest lecturer at numerous film schools in Europe, America, and Asia.
After working as an assistant director on feature films and directing several documentary films in Bosnian production before the war in former Yugoslavia in the 1990s, she directed four documentary films and one dance film in the Netherlands. Her films have been screened at around 60 festivals and have won awards across Europe, Asia, and the USA, including “Room Without a View” (1997), “Soske” (2001), “In Whitest Solitude” (2001), and “The Way to School” (2007). One of her films was screened and is currently in the collection of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York.
Rada is a member of NETPAC and the European Film Academy, within which she served on the documentary film jury in 2020 and 2021, and on the selection committee in 2022. She has been a jury member at approximately 50 international festivals.
Miloš Jaćimović
Miloš Jaćimović is a Serbian director of photography whose film about the Igalo Institute, “Sunset,” won the main award at this year’s Beldocs documentary film festival. He works between New York and Southeast Europe.
Among his recent achievements is the film “After Summer” (2024), directed by Oscar winner Danis Tanović, which had its world premiere as the opening film of the 30th Sarajevo Film Festival. He was the director of photography for the film “The Uncle” (2022), directed by David Kapac and Andrija Mardešić, which won the Special Jury Award in the Proxima program at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival. His collaboration with director Ivan Ikić includes the film “Oasis” (2020), which premiered in the “Giornate degli Autori” program of the Venice Film Festival, won the Europa Cinemas Label award, and was Serbia’s official candidate for the Oscar, as well as the film “Barbarians” (2014), which premiered at the Karlovy Vary festival.
His first feature film as director of photography was “Tilva Roš” (2010), directed by Nikola Ležaić, which won the Heart of Sarajevo award for Best Film and was nominated for the European Film Academy award for European Discovery of the Year. His directorial feature debut is the film “Sunset.”
Jaćimović has received multiple cinematography awards, including the award for best photography from the Serbian Association of Cinematographers for the film “Oasis,” the same association’s award for the film “The Uncle” in the category of minority co-production feature film, the award for best photography at the SEEfest in Los Angeles for the film “Borders, Raindrops,” the annual City of Belgrade award for film creation for “Tilva Roš,” as well as the Special Jury Award for photography at the Manaki Brothers International Film Camera Festival for the film “Nylon Dressed Ground.”
He studied cinematography at the Faculty of Dramatic Arts in Belgrade and has worked as a lecturer and mentor with film students and young authors through the Sarajevo Talent Campus, a masterclass organized by the Serbian Association of Cinematographers, as well as guest lectures at NYU Tisch School of the Arts and The New School for Social Research in New York.
Nikola Marković
Nikola Marković is a long-time journalist, editor, publicist, and writer, and the director of Radio Television Nikšić.
He was born in Nikšić in 1972. He graduated from the Faculty of Philology at the University of Montenegro in Nikšić.
In his decades-long successful journalistic career, he edited the daily newspaper “Dan,” the student magazine “Index,” the show “Semestar” on RTCG, and was a correspondent for Belgrade’s “Svedok” and “Telegraf” from Montenegro. From 2012 to 2021, he served as the president of the Government Commission for Monitoring Investigations of Attacks on Journalists, and was also a member of the OSCE Working Group in Vienna for media self-regulation, as well as the working group for media legislation. He participates in numerous panels, roundtables, lectures, and scientific and professional gatherings at home and abroad and is considered one of the most significant media professionals in Montenegro. For several years, he was a professional associate in practical teaching at the Faculty of Political Sciences, University of Montenegro.
He is the author of the books “Mafia Does Not Forgive” (journalism, 2005) and “I, Chat GPT” (novel, 2025), editor of the book “The Strong Word Killed Me” (journalism, 2006), as well as a reviewer and editor of numerous literary editions and series.
He is the recipient of the “Marko Miljanov” International Literary Award from the Association of Writers of Montenegro, the “Veljko Vlahović” Lifetime Achievement Award from the Association of Journalists of Montenegro, the European Union’s Special Recognition for Investigative Journalism “Investigative Journalism Awards in the Western Balkans and Turkey,” the Nikšić Liberation Award “September 18,” as well as the Association of Managers of Montenegro Award for Best Manager in 2025 in state-owned enterprises in Montenegro. He is the initiator of numerous educational, scientific, and cultural broadcasts, projects, and programs in Montenegrin media. He lives, works, and creates in Gornji Zagarač and Nikšić.
The 39th Herceg Novi Film Festival – Montenegro Film Festival will be held from August 22 to 28, at multiple locations in Herceg Novi, under the slogan “All Colors of Film.”
All current information about the program, films, and guests can be followed on the Festival’s official Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/filmfestivalhercegnovi) and Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/FFHNMFF) pages.
