Serbian

Review by James Berardinelli:
“If you turn on the evening news these days, one of the first images you’re likely to see will originate from the devastated former Yugoslavia, where centuries-old hatreds have boiled over to ignite a scenario of unspeakable horror. Yet the sights of Bosnia, presented by TV as gruesomely tantalizing tidbits of violence and death, rarely provoke a reaction from the casual viewer. That’s how it has always been with television news programs, however — their coverage of any event, designed for those with limited attention spans, is superficial in the extreme. It’s nearly impossible to generate any strong feeling for a situation, no matter how cruel or inhumane it is, when all you get is a quick series of MTV-like clips.Read More »

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When the war in Yugoslavia breaks out, an army officer who’s ethnic Slovenian yet still believes in Yugoslavia, decides to move to Belgrade. The country continues to fall apart and so does his family failing to find acceptance there.Read More »

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Set in the mountains of Serbia, the film takes place during the Christmas time in 1943. Chetnics (yugoslav army in the homeland) are stationed in the village and they deal with two American pilots who have crashed in the mountain nearby. Initially welcomed, the Americans believe they have found allies who will get them to the Partizans (communists) very soon. It does not work out that way, and while they are dined and wined at first, later on they are detained. During the night, however, the two captives escape…Read More »

Quote:In the Serbian drama “White White World: The Miner’s Opera” (“Beli Beli Svet”), the characters sing, but never dance. Formulated as a modern day Greek tragedy set in the decrepit southeastern mining town Bor, the movie follows a close group of alienated locals through misguided love affairs and other brash misdeeds. But the songs feature no choreography or other stylish methods of breaking the harsh, downtrodden tableaux. It’s a surprisingly effective strategy. With his sophomore effort, director Oleg Novkovic uses musical expression to frame inner monologues that would never work in spoken form. As a result, a story exclusively populated by damaged people engaged in morally ambiguous, often depraved behavior manages to evoke sympathy for all of them.Read More »

Vlada works as a truck driver during the NATO bombing of Serbia in 1999. Tasked with transporting a mysterious load from Kosovo to Belgrade, he drives through unfamiliar territory, surrounded by the consequences of the war. When his job is over, Vlada needs to return home and face the consequences of his actions.Read More »

In the first sequel of “Hi Inspector”, the cops Boki and Pajko get bored in their quite little town until the arrival of foreign visitors. These people reside at the local hotel where international conference on organ transplantation takes place. At the same time, the fresh corpses of deceased people begin to disappear, while the rumors about the vampires at the graveyard start spreading. The cops try to solve the riddle.Read More »

In 2001, a mass grave was discovered in a suburb of Belgrade. Soon, more were to be found. DEPTH TWO investigates the hidden story behind these horrid discoveries, and takes us back to 1999 and the atrocities committed in Kosovo.

Using the verbal testimonies of perpetrators and victims, DEPTH TWO unfolds like a hypnotic thriller that follows the trail of this untold massacre, in an attempt to uncover and give a voice to stories that are still intentionally buried in silence.Read More »

After decades of work in Italy and Germany, Giuseppe is retired and returns to his family home in Istria. He is lonely and his mother advises him to get married. She hands him over his father’s uniform from the Austro-Hungarian army. Giuseppe sets off on a quest to find a wife in the “transitional East” hoping to be warmly welcomed. The road takes him to Budapest, Montenegro, Vojvodina. His plan is not so easily realised…Read More »

Synopsis:
Based on a novel by Branko Copic and set during World War II, the film tells the story of a Serbian village in the mountains of Bosnia and its villagers who found themselves divided along two opposing ideological lines, represented by the Chetniks and the Partisans. These two opposing sides are personified in the Partisan commander Španac (Mustafa Nadarevic) and a former royal army officer Radekic (Branislav Lecic. Španac comes off as a brainwashed fanatic, obsessed with his political agenda and willing to put them to practice at all cost, while the other is a practical realist, a local man whose priority is saving the local people from the turmoils of war, even if this means forsaking his own ideals. Španac sees him as the cause of villagers’ resistance to the new, communist, ideology and so the main plot axis is the conflict between them.Read More »