Aug 27, 2006, 2:42 GMT
Sarajevo - The 12th Sarajevo Film Festival (SFF) was officially closed Saturday evening in the Bosnian capital, after the ceremony to declare the winners of the biggest film festival in South-Eastern Europe.
The movie Gospodjica (Miss) by young Croatian director Andrea Staka won the Festival's top prize, the Heart Of Sarajevo award.
The awards for best actor and best actress also went to Croatians Rakan Rushaidat and Marija Skaricic.
The special honour of the SFF was given to British actor-director Mike Leigh, who has been supporting the festival in Sarajevo since its establishment 12 years ago - amid the 1992-95 war in Bosnia- Herzegovina as cultural resistance to killings and massive destruction in the country.
More than 100,000 movie fans, according to SFF organizers, attended projections during eight days of more than 165 movies from 41 countries around the world.
Before the 12th SFF was officially closed, Bosnia's filmmakers announced in Sarajevo that they decided to nominate Bosnian film Grbavica by young Sarajevo director Jasmila Zbanic as the country's entrant for the foreign-language Oscar in the top US movie prizes, the Academy Awards.
Grbavica tells the emotional story of a woman struggling to raise her child - the product of a wartime rape. Earlier this year, the film won a prestigious Golden Bear at the Berlin international film festival.
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