Efim Graboy’s film Valley of the Rulers, shot during the 12th International Student Film Camp “Interaction 2017”, has won two awards (Audience Award and Best Short Documentary Award) at the ECU Escuela de Cine del Uruguay. It is the 19th edition of the festival.
Valley of the Rulers is a documentary that tells the story of a year in the life of people in the nursing home on Zabučje Hill above Užice in Serbia. The film is produced by NFC Filmart from Požega (Serbia) and Okapi Studio from Israel. The film is directed by Israel’s Efim Graboy, while the rest of the crew is represented by film students from different countries – Walid Messnaoui from Morocco (editor), Constanza Sandoval from Argentina (director of photography), Anton Levkin from Russia (cinematographer and sound designer) and Milena Šmigić from Serbia (executive producer).
This documentary short was made during the film camp in August 2017 in Užice and produced by NFC Filmart. It is a poetic and metaphysical view of the everyday life of a distant nursing home at the top of the mountain above Užice, which is the place closest to paradise. For these old people, this is the last stop in life. As they await the end, enclosed within the walls of the nursing home and in their tired bodies, these people fight for the freedom of the soul, which becomes the only place where they can feel young and alive. This is the story of a struggle between light and darkness, between suffering and acceptance, and life and death.