Film Forum

Montenegro’s Official Selection for Best International Feature Film at the 99th Academy Awards®

WINNER, GRAND JURY PRIZE, WORLD CINEMA DOCUMENTARY,
2026 SUNDANCE FILM FESTIVAL
 
The highlands of Montenegro are the breathtaking setting for this story of mother Gara and teenage daughter Nada, who tend to sheep and cows, gather herbs, and make cheese every summer. The Sinjajevina plateau is a remote, sacred, ancestral pasture, yet the modern world intrudes in the form of an incongruous government plan to install a NATO military shooting range there. Filming over seven years, co-directors Tutorov and Glomazić vividly capture the indefatigable efforts of Gara to cultivate support from her neighbors to guard the land that benefits them all, as Nada learns hard truths about her family’s history.

Presented with support from The Ashes and Diamonds Fund for Eastern European Film and The Endowed Fund for Emerging Filmmakers
 
2026     105 MIN.     SERBIA / FRANCE / MONTENEGRO / SLOVENIA / CROATIA
IN MONTENEGRIN WITH ENGLISH SUBTITLES     SUBMARINE DELUXE

Reviews

“A quietly powerful feminist fable.”
– Pat Mullen,  POV

“Both intimate and universal... masterful, empathetic... Wider themes of endangered tradition, generational tension and cultural displacement are brought into sharp focus through quiet, respectful and keenly-edited observation... an immersive portrait of mountain life, which never tips into nostalgia or romanticism. Throughout, Montenegro’s stunning landscape is a constant presence, captured in expansive wide shots or carefully composed static compositions; the morning light hitting the tops of the mountains, sheep winding up the hillside, a constant reminder of the fragility and strength of this land and its people.”
– Nikki Baughan, Screen

“Filmmakers Biljana Tutorov and Petar Glomazić pull off a miraculous trick with TO HOLD A MOUNTAIN. What begins as a slow-burn observational documentary gradually reveals itself as an emotionally shattering meditation on grief and perseverance. Gorgeously shot with a quiet, deliberate rhythm, it’s the kind of film that entrances its audience without them noticing. Only at the end does the audience fully grasp the magnitude of the story it chronicles and the natural beauty of the images they have  been witnessing all along... quiet in its storytelling and appears small in its ambitions, but ultimately feels volcanic in the emotions it stirs.”
– Murtada Elfadl, Variety

“A paean to female strength and resistance... with stunning images of verdant pastures and clouds and fog sinking into the high mountain peaks. It’s a land seemingly untouched by the modern world, but the jagged rocks that dot the hills are nothing if not warnings of hidden dangers.”
– Derek Smith, Slant Magazine