(L-R) Ivana Shekutkoska, Georgi Unkovski, Arif Jakup, and Ivan Unkovski attend the 2025 Sundance Film Festival premiere of “DJ Ahmet” at The Egyptian Theatre on January 23, 2025, in Park City, UT. (Photo by Andrew H. Walker/Shutterstock for Sundance Film Festival)
By Sandy Phan
Macedonian writer-director Georgi M. Unkovski (Sticker, 2020 Sundance Film Festival) returns to the 2025 Sundance Film Festival for the world premiere of his first feature film, DJ Ahmet in the World Cinema Dramatic Competition. As the film team walks onto the stage at The Egyptian Theatre, they’re greeted enthusiastically by the audience in celebration of the film.
DJ Ahmet brings us to a small village in North Macedonia, where we meet Ahmet (Arif Jakup), a fifteen-year-old who takes care of his younger brother, Naim (Agush Agushev); tends to the family’s sheep; and develops deep feelings for a local girl, Aya (Dora Akan Zlatanova), causing mischief throughout their rural hometown.
The youthful and vibrant cast lends an air of freshness and innocence to the film, but casting wasn’t so easy. Unkovski shares, “We saw many kids around Macedonia. And it was a long process — three months — we saw around 3,000 kids, and then we brought it down to 60.”
While many of the characters in DJ Ahmet are loving and comical, they have complexities that carry the weight of the story. The conflict between Ahmet and his father is an age-old developmental struggle, heightened by the absence of Ahmet’s mother. When asked how he decided to characterize Ahmet’s father and the resolution between father and son, Unkovski says, “We were struggling in editing in terms if he was too mean or too evil, and dialing down this character trait and trying to make him so that the audience would have more compassion for him and understanding where this comes from. That it’s not from a stereotype. I hope we brought this closer to that in the end and that he’s a humane character, not just this old guy.”
Authenticity’s importance is made clear by the film’s location, the spoken language in the film (Turkish), and the casting of local people. “Northern Macedonia has a large Turkish minority, which is around 100,000 people — four percent of the population. These villages are unique to Macedonia … I wanted to tell the story as authentically as possible, so there is no discussion of [changing] the language. I don’t speak Turkish, by the way,” Unkovski admits, to laughter from the audience, “so that was the most difficult aspect of the filming for me. And then we discovered Arif — he’s actually from the village where we shot the film.” Here, the audience erupts with delight. Unkovski adds, “Most of the villagers speak Macedonian, and this was our common language, but we also had a great acting coach who spoke Turkish.”
One of the joys of the film is how the music enhances the story and the acting and sets into motion the movement and dancing of the cast. Unkovski says, “We were deciding this until two weeks ago. It’s a long process to fine-tune what music is coming from the set and location versus the score.” On stage, one of the music composers adds that they focused on making a folk music melting pot, where they incorporated Macedonian music with African and Asian rhythmic influences.
If you’re looking for an endearing movie about a boy who loves music and dance, his brother, his dad, and a girl who is arranged to be married to someone else, set your sights on this film. Funny and sweet, DJ Ahmet reminds us that first love can happen anywhere, especially with the power of a catchy harmony.
