All activities / Film Festivals / Mokra Gora
Film Festivals in Mokra Gora
The mountain valley where Emir Kusturica built Drvengrad, a wooden village with its own film festival, and where the Sargan Eight steam railway still loops the hills.
Run by Rasta International, with published dates and a real program.
Dates & details verified against: Official event site ↗
Why here
Kustendorf is the only film festival on earth held in a village a Palme d'Or winner built for his own film: Drvengrad, the wooden town Emir Kusturica raised on Mecavnik hill while shooting Life Is a Miracle, with its Stanley Kubrick cinema, galleries, and streets named for Fellini and Bergman. The festival, organized by Kusturica's Rasta International under the Ministry of Culture's patronage, runs each late January with no red carpet and no commercial sponsors: film students screen alongside masters, and past guests run from Johnny Depp to Nuri Bilge Ceylan. The rest of the year the village hosts you anyway, and the Sargan Eight heritage railway loops its figure-eight through the hills below from April to October.
Best months
The festival runs four to five days in late January, the 2026 edition January 22-25; treat each next year's dates as expected-late-January until Rasta International announces. Winter mountain roads want care. The village, its cinema, and the railway make the valley a destination in any season.
Getting there & around
Four hours' drive from Belgrade, or combine with Tara and Zlatibor next door. Stay in Drvengrad itself; the Sargan Eight runs April 1 to October 31 with extra summer departures.
Skill levels: beginner
Schools & guides (1)
Drvengrad Mecavnik
OrganizerKusturica's wooden village on Mecavnik hill: hotel, six restaurants, the Stanley Kubrick cinema, and the host venue of the Kustendorf festival each January.