Erand Sojli

As Nazi's arrive in his village, an Albanian peasant is torn between protecting his family or saving two Jewish men he's been hiding for a year.

Bota (Albanian for “the world”) is a cafe situated on the edge of a vast area of marshland in a remote part of Albania, and it is here that the lives of the protagonists intersect in this compelling debut by Iris Elezi and Thomas Logoreci. The directors skilfully exploit the genius loci of the desolate landscape and, aided by a period score and beguiling long shots, they flawlessly evoke the atmosphere of a place where the past still encroaches upon people’s lives.

The film describes how Albanian graves were opened by Greeks and the contents moved and re-identified as being the bones of Greek soldiers from World War II.