To Hold A Mountain premiered at the 2026 Sundance Film Festival.
It played in the World Cinema Documentary Competition section.
Directors Biljana Tutorov and Petar Glomazić center survival, sustenance and resistance in the Balkan highlands.
Premiering in the World Cinema Documentary Competition at the 2026 Sundance Film Festival, Biljana Tutorov and Petar Glomazić’s To Hold A Mountain is richly alert to ecology, motherhood and all the burdens both carry. The two are entwined here in a complex negotiation of safety and freedom, shelter and agency. Loss hangs over the film—both past and that which could barge in any time. Montenegro’s Sinjajevina mountains hover over the central lives, patiently and delicately observed. This dazzling jewel in the Balkans means everything to Gara and Nada.
Gara is the aunt of the thirteen-year-old Nada, but also her adoptive mother, ever since an ugly crime that shattered the family. Nada’s biological mother Mika was murdered by her abusive husband. Nada has no memory of Mika but does recall her father who’s been in prison since. The time for his release is nearing. Gara frets over the impending situation. She isn’t anxious about losing Nada but the heavier onus of possible turmoil resurfacing might be too overwhelming and untenable. It’s to confront again the tide of trauma and grief they have struggled to emerge from. Their lives would be rent apart with confusion, uncertainty and a hose-thrust of pent-up rage.
This is a tale of resilience and resistance, holding fort on the land that’s nurtured and nourished generations. Gara is driven to look towards posterity. She’s tenacious, fearless and rock-solid certain how she’ll blow out intrusion. The military has been razing in to set up a NATO training ground. Should that come to pass, the entirety of the pastoral vastness would be pillaged. The delicate natural balance the tribes have carefully and discerningly honed would crumble. Gara wants to watch out for those coming after her. The mountains aren’t just her heritage but the very life stream, the sustenance of the community. Severed from it, their lives would fall apart. Gara calls the mountain her mother. It’s this ecological lineage, a sense of home and belonging in the mountains Gara wishes Nada to imbibe and base as her anchor. Every time Nada goes away for school, the promise of return lingers in the air.
Tutorov and Glomazić establish an unmediated access to their lives as far as possible. We hike with them through dense snow, guiding cattle and getting back to shelters. A gentle, deeply felt kinship between the herders, animals and the untempered breathtaking natural span clasps the film. It’s a difficult life but Gara bears it with gratitude and immense fortitude. Violence hasn’t dented her spirit, only strengthened her further. She can be endlessly inspiring for her daughter, if the latter chooses to be open and permeable. Nada is curious and engaged in her surroundings, never grumbling or grudging limitations it might seem to project. Instead, what swirls between them are parental obligations, especially the bereavement limning Nada’s childhood.
DP Eva Kraljević registers the picturesque magnificence. Her camera maintains a steady, unobtrusive pose. There are these stunning, rolling vistas cradled in mighty peaks and limitless expanses. It’s as beautifully humbling as formidable in scale and significance. Days of eking out an existence are long and toiling. Nature exerts itself, reminding us of all the ravages we lay upon it. The film’s collective quest of resistance isn’t as bracing as its heart of maternal anxiety beckons. But we do get a measure of the peace and harmony on a standstill of rupture. The documentary intersperses an air of serenity within a community huddled together, with the poised threat of complete disintegration. The military’s roving eye stays omnipresent.
A tender film, lit by a sky-wide appeal for preservation, To Hold A Mountain is at its most moving when it circles back to the horrors Gara has fought back. The film doesn’t go too long on it, but one of the conversations reflects the arduous battle for justice she has waged. She is much too wise to be swindled by skewed institutions like the judiciary. Yet, life’s trials don’t just seem to end. It keeps throwing hostilities as if to test what it’ll take to fully exhaust her, tie her down into resignation. There’s an inveterate doggedness in her to take on the mightiest if her loved ones, her home is at stake. She’s a trailblazer in her community, the beacon of hope that doesn’t cut petty deals with the devils. She’s both rescue and remembrance of the towering mountains. To Hold A Mountain honours her unerring commitment as the very fulcrum of life itself.
Debanjan Dhar is covering the Sundance Film Festival 2026 as part of the accredited press.
