78 Days

Opening Night Film

Q&A with the film’s Digital Specialist, Alex Wiske, following the screening on 3/14.

As bombs drop from NATO planes in the skies of former Yugoslavia in 1999, three sisters use the family’s Hi8 camcorder to document their everyday lives for their father who was recently conscripted into the army. Through this lens we see them playing games, developing crushes, getting in fights, and throwing birthday parties. But despite these attempts, they are always reminded by the bombs—and their mother—that normalcy cannot exist. The film, which could easily be mistaken for a documentary, powerfully recreates the feeling and sound of a piece of media pulled from a family’s archive. Its reinvention of the found footage technique captures the intimacy of the sisters’ relationships and the moments they share, and highlights the collective memory created by coming of age in the shadow of conflict. This is the film’s U.S. premiere.