Djokovic Documentary Premieres Above Kotor: ‘The Wolf in Winter’ Screened on Lovćen

A month after its world premiere at MoMA in New York, the film about the 24-time Grand Slam champion was shown to around 200 guests at Forza Kuk, the restaurant beside the Kotor–Lovćen cable car

Montenegro hosted one of the most high-profile cultural evenings of its summer season this week. The documentary NOVAK DJOKOVIC: The Wolf in Winter was screened on Tuesday evening at the Forza Kuk restaurant, perched beside the Kotor–Lovćen cable car station, in front of around 200 invited guests.

The screening was organised by Djokovic in cooperation with his foundation, a month after the film's world premiere at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, and just over a week before it becomes available to a global audience.

The guest list drew heavily from the region's sporting and business elite. Basketball figures Vlade Divac and Nemanja Nedović attended, alongside footballers Stevan Jovetić and Marko Pantelić. Deško Portić and Stevan Milić, directors of Porto Montenegro and Portonovi respectively, represented the country's two flagship luxury marina developments.

Businessmen Jugoslav Karić and Aleksandar Kostić were among the attendees from the commercial world, joined by a broad cross-section of figures from regional business. Djokovic's family was present throughout the evening.

The choice of venue was itself part of the statement. Forza Kuk sits at the upper station of the Kotor cable car, roughly 1,300 metres above sea level, with a terrace that looks out across the entire Bay of Kotor. Few settings in Europe offer a comparable backdrop for an evening screening, and the location has quickly become one of Montenegro's most photographed viewpoints since the cable car opened.

NOVAK DJOKOVIC: The Wolf in Winter is a feature-length documentary directed by Jason Hehir, the Emmy Award-winning filmmaker behind The Last Dance, the Michael Jordan series that became one of the most widely watched sports documentaries ever made.

The film traces Djokovic's path from the hardscrabble courts of Serbia during a period of war and economic hardship, to a career that has rewritten the record books: 24 Grand Slam titles, more than 1,100 career singles wins, an Olympic gold medal, and a record 428 weeks at world number one.

Rather than a conventional archive biography, the documentary is built on behind-the-scenes access — at major tournaments, through his training regimen, and in quieter moments at home with family and friends.

"Tennis has given me so much, but the greatest battles were never only on the court," Djokovic said in the film's announcement. "This documentary is about the moments people didn't see — the doubts, the sacrifices, and the work of constantly evolving beyond the story so many think they know."

The documentary features intimate interviews with Djokovic himself, his wife Jelena, and members of his family, alongside some of the most significant figures in the sport's history.

Rafael Nadal, Andre Agassi, Pete Sampras, Boris Becker and Jim Courier all appear, as do media figures Mary Carillo, Patrick McEnroe, Howard Bryant, Chris Clarey and Matthew Futterman.

Producers describe the result as a portrait of a complicated figure whose difficult moments are inseparable from the fire that made him a champion — an acknowledgment that Djokovic remains among the most polarising athletes of his generation, even as his statistical case as the greatest men's player in history has become difficult to argue against.

NOVAK DJOKOVIC: The Wolf in Winter premieres worldwide on 20 August, exclusively on Prime Video, in more than 240 countries and territories.

The film is presented by Prime Video Sports and produced by Words + Pictures with Little Room Films, in association with Sweet Relief and Sadoux Productions.

Djokovic's presence in the country was not limited to the screening. He spent part of his summer resting on the Montenegrin coast and training at Porto Montenegro in Tivat, preparing for the North American hard-court season.

From Montenegro he travels to the Cincinnati Masters, followed by the US Open, the final Grand Slam of the season, which begins on 30 August. He has entered the mixed doubles competition in New York alongside Aryna Sabalenka.

Djokovic is a long-standing regular on the Montenegrin coast, and his choice to hold the film's regional premiere here — rather than in Belgrade or another major regional city — reinforces a connection that has developed over years of summers spent on the Adriatic.

The screening adds to a season in which Montenegro has drawn a remarkable concentration of international attention. The country hosted the EU–Western Balkans Summit in Tivat in June, welcomed NBA legend Magic Johnson and newly crowned world champion Rodri over the summer, and will stage the World Travel Awards Europe Gala at Kotor Bay in October.

For a country of 620,000 people, hosting the regional premiere of a globally distributed documentary about one of sport's defining figures — in a restaurant suspended above one of the Mediterranean's most striking bays — is the kind of evening that says a good deal about where Montenegro now sits on the international map.