Book at the Cinema: Bronja Žakelj - "Bijelo se pere na devedeset"

As part of the Month of Croatian Books, we continue our Books at the Cinema programme, organised in collaboration with Kino Valli. On Wednesday, 28 October 2026, Bronja Žakelj will visit Pula to present her book Bijelo se pere na devedeset. A few days after the presentation, audiences will have the opportunity to see the film adaptation at Kino Valli. The film was screened at the 73rd Pula Film Festival as part of the minority co-productions programme.

Bronja Žakelj was born in Ljubljana in 1969. She is a qualified journalist who put her passion for writing aside for many years while working in marketing and banking. After her children had grown up, she found more freedom and room for creative thought, returned to a long-forgotten love, and decided that it was time to write her first book. In 2019, her novel Bijelo se pere na devedeset received the Kresnik Award for Best Slovenian Novel. Within less than two years of its publication, it had gone through seven editions. An Italian edition was published in 2019, while Bulgarian and Macedonian editions are in preparation.

From the opening pages of the novel, we travel alongside the young Bronja to the 1970s and 1980s, where she introduces us to her family. This small community lives in Ljubljana, and the cheerful, carefree days of childhood are interrupted by her mother's diagnosis of a serious illness, which profoundly changes the lives of the entire family. At the age of fourteen, Bronja finds herself caught in the eye of the storm—old enough to understand what is happening, yet too young to have any influence over the situation. Bijelo se pere na devedeset is a perceptive autobiographical novel about growing up, illness and loss, but also about hope, love and the search for light in the darkest moments.

The novel won the Kresnik Award in 2019 and achieved great success in Slovenia. It was also adapted into a film of the same title, directed by Marko Naberšnik, which became the most-watched Slovenian film of the past ten years, attracting more than 100,000 viewers. The film premiered at the Sarajevo Film Festival in 2025.