# A Kosovar romance cracks open a racist town

> Tommaso Usberti's first feature swept Venice Critics' Week with a love story set against Northern Italian bigotry.
- Title: A Kosovar romance cracks open a racist town · Variety
- Summary: Tommaso Usberti's first feature swept Venice Critics' Week with a love story set against Northern Italian bigotry. Venice Critics' Week gave its grand prize…
- Keywords: venice film festival, italian cinema, debut films, film awards, toxic masculinity, entertainment, culture, Kosovar, romance, cracks, open, racist
- Source: Variety — https://variety.com/2026/film/festivals/venice-critics-week-winners-before-the-war-top-prize-1236858569
- Author: Nick Vivarelli
- Published: 2026-09-11T17:00:00+00:00
- Read time: 1 min
- Topics: venice film festival, italian cinema, debut films, film awards, toxic masculinity, entertainment, culture
## Italy's only entry wins big
Tommaso Usberti's "Before the War" took the grand prize at Venice Critics' Week, the section reserved for first features from around the world.
## Two prizes, not one
The film also picked up the award for best producer, making it the clear standout of the 2026 lineup.

> the big winner of the Venice Critics' Week where it scooped the grand prize and the award for best producer
## Set on the Northern plains
Usberti, an Italian director based in Paris, places the story in the flat farmland of Northern Italy, a landscape with its own closed social codes.
## A boy raised on bigotry
The lead is a young man named Guido, formed by a racist milieu that told him exactly who belongs and who does not.

> a young man named Guido, raised within a Northern Italian racist milieu
## Then he meets Sonia
Guido becomes attracted to Sonia, a Kosovar immigrant. The romance runs straight at everything he was raised to believe.
## Racism and masculinity together
Usberti treats the two as one problem rather than separate themes, using a love story to show how each one props up the other.
## Key takeaway

Venice Critics' Week gave its grand prize to a debut about a young man raised on racism who falls for the woman his world taught him to hate.