European Film Academy CEO and director Matthijs Wouter Knoll, Greek director Athena Rachel Tsangari, director Igor Bezinovic and actress Sara Klimoska will join Emily Watson to chair the competition program jury at the upcoming Sarajevo Film Festival.
Watson, who will return to play Shakespeare’s Mary in Chloe Zhao’s adaptation of Maggie O’Farrell’s historical novel HamnetHe will chair the jury this year. She joins a group of film composers who have previously chaired the festival in previous editions, including Sergey Loznitsa (2025), Paul Schrader (2024), Mia Wasikowska (2023), Ruben Östlund (2019), Asghar Farhadi (2018), Michel Franco (2017), Mike Leigh (2004) and many others.
Watson’s notable film credits include Lars von Trier Breaking waves and Hillary and JackieBoth earned her Academy Award nominations for Best Actress for A24 God’s creatures Opposite Paul Mescal Little things like this, Gosford Park, Punch drunk love, The theory of everything And more. You just wrapped Season 2 of the HBO/Max series Dune: Prophecy.
Last year she received the Richard Harris Award at the 2025 BIFAs, which recognized her outstanding contribution to British film. Other awards include the Joseph Plateau Honorary Award at the Ghent Film Festival, a Lifetime Achievement Award at the San Sebastian International Film Festival and a BAFTA Best Actress Award for her role in Suitable adult. Watson received Emmy and Golden Globe nominations for her work on the HBO/Sky mini-series Chernobyl In 2019.
Wouter Knoll has been CEO and Director of the European Film Academy since 2021 and is responsible for the executive management and vision of all programs relevant to the Academy’s current and future activities, including brand and audience development, knowledge exchange, cinematic heritage projects and the annual European Film Awards.
He has served as a creative and co-producer on 30 award-winning documentaries, working with directors such as Heidi Honigmann, María Augusta Ramos, and Manny Kaul. For ARTE, he co-produced a digital edition of 40 re-mastered works by Dutch documentary director Johan van der Keuken, which won the Prix Cahiers Due Cinéma in 2006.
After a short stint at IDFA, he spent 12 years on the Berlinale team, first as head of Berlinale talent programming and then as director of the European Film Market. Having launched several new training and industry platforms over the course of his career, Wouter Knoll has become an advocate for greater diversity, equality and inclusion, introducing plans to support this at Berlinale Talents, EFM and the European Film Academy.
Director, screenwriter and producer Tsangari is considered the main instigator of the Greek New Wave. Her genre-bending films explore power, desire, gender, and class. Her 2001 feature Slow business to goa sci-fi thriller filmed in hotel rooms in nine cities around the world, won multiple Best Picture and Best Director awards worldwide and is new to MoMA’s permanent film collection.
Her advantage was in her sophomore year Attenberg It premiered in the competition category in Venice, where it won the Coppa Volpi and the Lina Mangiacapre Directing Award. Her 2015 movie Chevalier It won Best Film at the BFI London Film Festival and was nominated for Best Foreign Film at the Independent Spirit Awards. Both films were Greece’s official submissions for Best International Film at the Academy Awards.
She has produced a number of award-winning films through her Athens-based Haos Film company, including one by Yorgos Lanthimos. Kineta and the Alps“Georgis Gregorakis” digger She was also an associate producer for Richard Linklater Before midnight. Its latest features cropa neo-Western starring Caleb Landry Jones and Harry Melling, premiered at the Venice Film Festival in competition in 2024.
Film by Croatian director Bežinović Fuyumi or death! It received numerous awards, including the European Film Award for Best Documentary as well as Best Film, Best Director and Best Screenplay at the Adriatic Film and Television Awards.
His other works include documentaries Siege and Feruda – a film about BoyanBoth won the Octavijan Award for Best Croatian Documentary Film. His first feature Short tripIt premiered in Rotterdam and won the Grand Golden Arena Award for Best Film at the Pula Film Festival.
North Macedonian actress Klimoska is directing from Milcho Manchevski’s film Brother sister manhole cover. This represents her third collaboration with the director after that Willow and generous. Her other film credits include: You won’t be aloneby Goran Stolevksy, which premiered at Sundance; Housekeeping for beginnerswhich was exhibited in Venice; Things left unsaid By Eleonora Vininova; and Earl King By Goran Radovanovic among others.
She has been part of the Talents Sarajevo program at the Sarajevo Film Festival and the Berlinale Talents. In 2022, she was nominated for the Heart of Sarajevo Award for her role in the TV series under. The previous year, she was recognized as a European Shooting Star for her performance in Lena and Vladimir. Klimoska is now turning to directing and writing and is currently developing her second short film Chained.
32Second abbreviation The Sarajevo Film Festival will take place from August 14 to 21, 2026.
