Albanian girl falls in love with a Serb/ Italians shoot a film in Rehovo, Cologne

2023-12-19 20:24:00, Qyteti im CNA

Albanian girl falls in love with a Serb/ Italians shoot a film in Rehovo,

The well-known tourist village of Rehova returns to the filming location for the Italian director Guilia Grandinetti.

The subject of the film is a relationship created between a Serb and an Albanian girl, a relationship that ends at the altar.

Rehova was chosen quite randomly by the Italian director. She had come to Albania to choose the right place to shoot this film. A defect in her vehicle in Erseke was enough to choose this city but much more Rehova, known as the ideal shooting location for her film.

"I chose Rehova 5 years ago when I was looking for the right place for this story, in fact the car broke down. I slept in Erseka and when I was chosen I saw everything here, I realized that it was the ideal place for my film.

The film tells the story of an Albanian girl who falls in love with a Serbian boy, uniting Albania and Serbia in a certain sense. The story comes like Romeo and Juliet but has a happy ending, it talks about patriarchy, nationality, femininity and female independence," director Guilia Grandinetti told CNA.

The director has chosen an Italian girl to play the Albanian character, perhaps because the characters are almost the same, which the main actress of the film Caterina Bagnulo also admits when she said that it is precisely because of this similarity of characters that she willingly accepted this role .

"It is a special experience, I had never been to Albania. Italians and Albanians are very similar, I adapted easily, it is a subtle but strong story. It is a universal story, not only between two peoples, and this made me accept to be part of this film", she said.

In the role of the girl's father, a man from Cologne has been chosen, an architect by profession, but who has convinced the cast of actors that his character fits well as that of the patriarchal Albanian father.

"It is a special emotion to put yourself in that position that you have not been. In our area, hatred has not been experienced so deeply, but this is a special emotion knowing the relationships we have, it is taboo to give the girl somewhere where there is hatred, and hard to accept," said Julian Jashari.

The filming will last for more than 30 days and will be concentrated in the village of Rehovo as well as in the city of Erseka.