Rajko Grlic was born in 1947 in Zagreb. He directed his first amateur film at the age of 15, and his first professional short at 18. He studied and graduated from the Film Faculty of the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague (FAMU) at the same time as Emir Kusturica, a well known Serbian film director. Grlic was mentored by professor Elmar Klos.

His films have been distributed all around the world and shown in competition at many major film festivals. They have received more then fifty international awards including the Tokyo International Film Festival "Grand Prix" and "Best Director". Rajko has also written nine produced feature screenplays and two television serials. He has received numerous awards for writing including a UNESCO award, FIPRESCI award and "Peter Kastner" award.

Some of his great works are: Border Post,  Josephine,  Who Wants to be a President (documentary co-director), Charuga, That Summer of White Roses, Three for Happiness, In the Jaws of Life, You Love Only Once, Bravo Maestro.

As a producer Rajko has worked on five theatrical feature films including the last one “Just Between Us” (2010) and five short films. He has also directed three television documentary serials and a dozen short films. Rajko also write, direct and produce the CD-ROM  "How to make your Movie -An Interactive Film School" awarded with eight international awards including  "Grand Award" as the best multimedia at New York Festival 1998.
  
Currently, Rajko is an Eminent Professor in Film at Ohio University in Athens, Ohio and artistic director of the Motovun Film Festival held annually in Croatia.