The majority attitude towards the "Quo Vadis, Aida?" film in Serbia (about the 1995 Srebrenica genocide) is silence and instead of congratulating the winners, we mostly remain quiet, Predrag Miki Manojlovic, one of the most famous actors in the region, told the Belgrade NIN weekly on Thursday.

He added that every outstanding award that a film from our or neighbouring countries received was important for the whole of the Balkans.

„It draws the world’s attention to our creativity. That is why prestigious awards are important not only for the winners but for all of us,“ Manojlovic said.

The film made by famous Bosnian director Jasmila Zbanic won all European film awards for 2021 and was the country’s candidate for the Oscar in the foreign languages movies category.

It tells the story of a Bosnian woman, an interpreter for the UN forces in the war-torn country which failed to prevent the genocide in Srebrenica, although the town was declared a UN safe zone. The woman survived but could not save her family.

Official Belgrade refuses to accept the verdicts by two international courts saying that the event from July 1995 in Srebrenica was genocide.
Serbia's authorities and nationalist politicians, historians and lawyers admit it has been a terrible crime but say it cannot constitute genocide by definition.

“‘Quo Vadis, Aida?’ is marked by the role of fantastic actress Jasna Djuricic, without whom this film would not exist. Majority silence (in Serbia) is not the answer to the three biggest awards by the European Film Academy this film received,” Manojlovic added.

Zbanic told N1 that if Serbia's state RTS TV aired the film, that would mean the end of the 1992-1995 war.

Montenegro's state broadcaster aired the film amid a protest of people who considered themselves Monetengrin Serbs. They said that a crime was committed in Srebrenica, but not genocide.