U2’s Bono Wows Crowd, Serenades Sarajevo in Surprise Appearance at Bosnian Film Festival

U2 frontman Bono made a surprise appearance Friday night at the opening ceremony of the Sarajevo Film Festival, with the Irish pop star leading a rapturous crowd in an a cappella rendition of Bob Marley’s “Redemption Song.”

The legendary vocalist took the stage after an emotional screening of “Kiss the Future,” director Nenad Cicin-Sain’s documentary, produced by Ben Affleck and Matt Damon, about U2’s relationship with war-torn Sarajevo in the 1990s. He was accompanied by bandmate the Edge and their wives, Ali Hewson and Morleigh Steinberg, along with model and activist Christy Turlington and veteran CNN reporter Christiane Amanpour.

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Based on American-born aid worker Bill Carter’s “Fools Rush in: A Memoir,” “Kiss the Future” chronicles the band’s efforts to publicize the plight of the city’s besieged civilians during the Bosnian War.

After taking the microphone in front of a stunned and rapt audience, Bono belted out the opening bars of Marley’s iconic track before many in the crowd, cell phones held high, joined in.

The surprise appearance was the latest chapter in the Irish rock legend’s long-running love affair with the city of Sarajevo. Three decades ago, Bono was approached by Carter, who was working with an American aid group and wanted to draw attention to the growing humanitarian crisis in Bosnia, where war had broken out in 1992.

A year later, during the European leg of U2’s Zoo TV Tour, the band broadcast live satellite feeds from Sarajevo in the middle of its near four-year siege. In September 1997, they held a concert in the war-ravaged city.

In his review of “Kiss the Future,” Variety‘s Chris Willman described it as “the story of a long-distance romance, between a superstar rock quartet reaching its peak and a once-grand metropolis that’s bottoming out.”

He continued: “The early parts of the film emphasize the scrappy nature of the whole endeavor, and Bono’s eagerness to directly engage with guerrilla telecasters in front of audiences of tens of thousands. Carter somehow got an OK on doing an interview with the singer for the Bosnian resistance’s pirate television channel, traveling to Rome and somehow bumbling his way — early Cameron Crowe style — into an audience with the world’s biggest rock star. The huge LED images of the ‘Zoo TV’ tour were meant to satirize the proliferation of mass media, yet here was Bono, subverting his own subversion by using the somewhat tongue-in-cheek tech to aggressively advocate for peace after all, like a moth drawn back to the socially conscious flame.”

Two years ago, Bono made another surprise visit to the Sarajevo Film Festival, where he introduced a digitally restored version of Wim Wenders’ “The Million Dollar Hotel” — a film the iconic rock star presented at the Bosnian fest in 2000.

Addressing a full house at the Sarajevo National Theater – where fans had gathered outside for more than an hour in the blistering heat, clutching photos and singing along to U2’s hits as they waited for his arrival on the red carpet – Bono told the audience: “It’s really good to be here. It feels like a long time, and yet also a short time.”

The Sarajevo Film Festival runs Aug. 11 – 18.

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