By Robert St. Martin
An interesting smaller documentary at this year’s SEEfest 2025 was Grand Prize, a 40-minute-long peak into the lives of two younger people involved in the Croatian ballroom scene in Croatia’s capital city of Zagreb. Filmmaker Anja Koprivsek set out to make a film about the current popular ballroom scene in Zagreb and ended up capturing a glimpse of the lives of two young Croatians: Valentina Pandzic aged 27 is an accomplished ballroom performer with her “voguing” at various nightclubs in the city and also teaches other aspiring ballroom performers how to master the moves. Valentina runs into a Teo Huremovic, a 21-year-old trans man who is searching for his place and ends up encouraged by Valentina to perform as a trans male mastering male strutting and moves on the Ballroom stage.
The film takes place against the backdrop of the thriving Croatian ballroom scene, which is popular is many larger cities in Eastern Europe, including Prague, Budapest, Poland, and even Russia. For LGBTQ+ people, ballroom represented and still represents a safe and inclusive space for expressing and questioning gender. Voguing is a highly stylized, improvisational dance form that originated in the LGBTQ+ ballroom scene in Harlem in the late 1980s – as so brilliantly captured in Jennie Livingston’s Paris Is Burning (1990). Inspired by fashion magazine model poses and incorporate elements of fashion, dance and self, expression, the key of voguing includes stylized poses, catwalk walks, duckwalks, spins, dips, and hand performances, all executed to the beat of house music and ballroom beats.
It was created by imitating model poses, martial arts, military parades and ancient Egyptian paintings, and is characterized by strict lines of arms, legs and body. That first form of “vogue” is today called the Old Way. In the 1990s, two more styles were developed: New Way, in which the emphasis is placed on the flexibility and elegance of the performers, and Vogue Femme, which was developed by transgender women trying to emphasize femininity through dance movements. This culminated in Madonna’s hit song “Vogue” in 1990 and the well-known video performance which brought “voguing” in the mainstream. The drag aspects were embraced by RuPaul and led to the television series “Pose.”
Originating with drag queen competition, voguing has always been about gender as performance. This creative performance through voguing was even used to peacefully settle disputes among rivals in an environment that assumed a degree of mutual respect and compassion. Using dance and pantomime, the voguers would “read” each other. Ultimately, the winner would be the person who “threw the best shade.”
In Croatia and particularly in Zagreb, the ballroom scene is perhaps a bit tamer and closer what was known as “Kiki,” a ballroom term, meaning something to be taken lightly. Kiki houses and Kiki balls began as less competitive versions of the ballroom scene. The Kiki Scene was created out of a need for a youth-only space that was more economically accessible and less competitive for youth. It is this that we see in Valentina’s encouragement of young transman Teo to compete as a trans male with typical man movements and rigidity. As we see in the documentary, Teo manages to win in his category – even though there does not seem to be much competition – hence Teo wins a “Grand Prize” in his designated competition category.
In Croatia, trans men have the legal right to change their legal gender and have their birth certificates amended to reflect their gender identity. While the law does not require surgery for legal gender change, it’s worth noting that the Croatian healthcare system, while providing gender-affirming care, may have specific requirements and procedures. Although not explained, this may be part of Teo’s confidence as a 21-year-old trans man who talks freely about himself and his preference for dating women.
On the other hand, Valentina who is older loves performance and sees her “free agent” solo routines with ballroom as her passion. Her movements emphasize her physical flexibility and her wild head spinning and hair whipping. The film shot in a fairly small window of time captures Valentina as a seasoned voguer introducing Teo to a ballroom world where he can be himself as a transman. Valentina is quite reserved and does not tend to share many words, but she provides the emotional support to Teo that he needs. Valentina has a “hip” mother who is supportive of Valentina’s ballroom dance world. Teo has unexplained issues with his own father and that was not included in the film. Teo’s strength of a young trans man is especially remarkable, considering how grounded he seems.
Teo’s persistence with finding his “performing” self helps Valentina embrace emotions she had kept at bay. She is seemingly gender fluid but open to a relationship with Teo. As time goes by, their relationship develops and deepens, transitioning from mentorship and friendship to a plan to share an apartment and a future together. In its short time frame, Grand Prize intertwines two worlds into a story about love, acceptance and the power of self-expression.
