The second day of the festival takes us through three programme blocks – STITCHES, SNAGS, and VIS-A-VIS – that explore ways in which we see ourselves in the worlds and the people around us, how we deal with insecurities and how past and present experiences leave traces in our lives.

VIS-A-VIS deals with reflections and mirrors – spaces and people in which we recognise parts of ourselves. These films take us into worlds where the boundaries between the reality and the surreal, personal and collective, start to be blurry.

SNAGS explore complex networks of relationships – familial, friendly, and societal – where tensions, duties and identities create intricate structures. Films in this block follow people growing up and maturing by coping with the rough edges of reality.

STITCHES open up a space between the visible and invisible, a place where silence and noise coexist, where intimate stories are allowed to connect with wider social narratives.

STICHES

Ashes

After losing her entire family in a tragic arson attack, Melanie drifts through the ruins of her own existence. Her days are marked by silence, her nights by memories she cannot escape. Life seems to have reduced her to nothing but ashes. A chance encounter with Katrin, a pregnant woman in need of a midwife, slowly pulls her back into the rhythm of life. In their daily closeness, Melanie relives her own memories of creating life—memories that are as painful as they are tender. Through this fragile bond between two women—one carrying new life, the other haunted by death— Melanie begins to confront her grief, to forgive, and to rediscover that even from ashes, something warm can rise again.

Between Heaven and Halls

When the last visitors leave and silence falls, the museum awakens in a different way. Staff members share their stories of unexplained sounds, shadows that vanish just too quickly, and objects that seem to look back at you. As they wander through empty halls, the boundary between perception and imagination begins to blur. The echo of an alarm, the creak of a floorboard, a painting that seems to look back— the museum and its objects find their voice.

There are things in life that cannot always be explained, and sometimes, that’s what makes them so intriguing. The film sheds light on the mysterious events that unfold in museums, focusing not on finding answers but on evoking wonder. It explores the stories that unexplained experiences leave.

Can you hear me?

Nastia, who has lived abroad for years, starts to teach her mom how to use Internet services. Different perceptions of technology become the starting point for exposing intergenerational conflicts and long-forgotten family threads. Can an intimacy regained via zoom be a turning point for the future relationship between two adults? 

The Undying Pain of Existence

A nude model is posing with statuesque stillness for an elite drawing class – until an unfortunate mosquito bite challenges his self-control. Driven to madness by the itch, he’s caught between the ruthless demand for perfection and his most unhinged, animalistic impulses.

SNAGS

A Good Mind Grows in Thorny Places

12-year-old Adam, a Romani kid with grown-up responsibilities, lives in the so called Slovakian “hungry valley”, trying to earn cash for energy drinks by chopping trees with his older brother.  Adam looks up to his brother for his tree-sawing skills, despite his devotion to a Slovak extremist party. 

Braided

My mother always carefully braided my hair so tightly that a clear path was pulled across the top of my head. lt ached faintly, and l resisted it instinctively, yet had no choice but to accept it. As I stumbled forward on my own for the first time, l occasionally felt a subtle, distant pull, delicate yet profound, unraveling the strength l pretended to have. Touching the painful path on my head, l saw a past and future that mirrored my mother’s, revealing my deeply rooted fear of a woman’s journey of growth. Neither of us were prepared to face separation and growth; we merely pretended to walk bravely toward an unprepared future. Facing a reality from which there is no retreat, l finally let out my true voice.

Cowboys

Billy is a cowboy who isn’t respected in his small town, lost in the middle of the Wild West. After a brawl breaks out in the local saloon, he seizes an opportunity to make a name for himself by setting off with his best friend and the sheriff in pursuit of a notorious outlaw.

The See In Between

A teenager helping his father in the family business gets stuck on a small boat with an older tourist. While anxiously waiting for his father to return with the day’s catch, the tourist begins to make lewd remarks.

Truth or dare

Alexandra and Denisa, two adolescent sisters, spend the summer holiday in the countryside. Alexandra tries to gain the attention of the older boys and show her older sister that she’s no longer just a kid.

VIS-À-VIS

8

In suburban housing estates in France, young people are wishing for money and success. Their dreams clog up the air conditioning ducts until everything begins to drip. What might happen if you swallow light?

Grand Prize

In conservative Croatia, ballroom offers a sanctuary for LGBTQIA+ performers. Valentina (29) is a talented voguer and trailblazer of the scene, while Teo (21) is a beginner, searching for community and acceptance. He finds both in Valentina, who supports him through his transition and guides him through his ballroom journey. As they grow closer, Teo’s warmth and determination lower her defences, making her open up to love for the first time. Soon enough, the young couple begins dreaming of a shared future. 

Wish you were ear

In a world where, after each break-up, ex-partners must exchange a chosen body part, Wish You Were Ear explores the lasting impact of relationships. People not only lose a literal piece of themselves with each split, but also carry visible reminders of every past love. 

The protagonist, feeling fragmented and deformed, yearns for their original, whole form. Yet, when they unexpectedly see their former ear on someone else, it sparks a journey of self-acceptance, revealing that these parts are what truly shape their identity.

The second day of STIFF leads us through looking glasses and reflections, through complications of growing up and intricate relationships, through stitches that connect personal and collective. These films explore how traces of past experiences create our present, where each crack and each thread in the fabric of life opens up space for introspection, empathy and better understanding of others.

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The International Student Film Festival — STIFF is organized by Filmaktiv and the Student Cultural Center of the University of Rijeka, in co-organization with Art-kino and with the support of the Croatian Audiovisual Centre (HAVC), the City of Rijeka, Primorje-Gorski Kotar County, the Rijeka Tourist Board, the Serbian National Council, the Council of the Serbian National Minority, and the Goethe-Institut Kroatien. The work of Filmaktiv is supported by the Kultura Nova Foundation and the National Foundation for Civil Society Development.