Conflict in Croatia between the pro-independence government and parts of the Serbian minority had slowly progressed from local skirmishes to a full-scale war. In June, Slovenia, the northernmost Yugoslav federal unit, had proclaimed its independence, and the federal army had responded with a brief, six-day military campaign. Pula looked perfectly normal and calm.īut, circumstances that summer in Yugoslavia were far from normal and calm. As every year in July, the city was plastered with film posters, the press center was already open, the catalogues printed, and the whole city was ready to welcome the most famous of the festival guests: Hollywood actor of Croatian origin, John Malkovich. The city at the tip of the Istrian Peninsula was ready-as it always was at that time of year-for the annual Yugoslav film festival to begin. In the last week of July 1991, the Croatian coastal city of Pula seemed to be an absolutely peaceful place. This is powerful film-making and draws upon the absurdist vein of Catch 22 and MASH it’s a bleakly occasionally comic portrayal of the war that is brilliantly made and uncomfortable to view from a political standpoint.From a Cinema of Hatred to a Cinema of Consciousness: Croatian Film after Yugoslavia By Jurica Pavičić Does that make the film racist? Not necessarily as it could be argued that this is a film from the Serbian perspective no doubt being surrounded by others who want to kill you is a terrifying experience and the enemy will seem monstrous. Krstic fails, however, to note that this is in itself racist – the enemy as the monstrous Other. The Muslims who surround the militia are entirely dehumanised, Krstic himself points out that this is drawing of tropes of Hollywood’s representation of the Vietnam war where ‘Charlie’ was an invisible presence in the jungle. That said I did find the film disturbing. One of the ways this is done is through the casting of Velimir Bata Zivojinovic as the unit’s commander Zivojinovic starred in many Partisan films that were important in the myth-making of Tito’s Yugoslavia. While it’s easy to see why the film appears to be pro-Serbian, as we rarely get any other view than the militia’s, Krstic also demonstrates the film’s nuances principally that the ragtag bunch of militia are not portrayed as likeable characters and in this the film is also challenging Serbia’s national mythology. In an excellent article Igor Krstic ( ) notes that although Croatian critics dubbed the film pro-Serbian (Croatia was also embroiled in the war against Serbs/Serbia) it was also the first Serbian film to be successful in neighbouring countries after the war ended. Unsurprisingly the film divided opinion when it was release. Much of the narrative features flashbacks of how the disparate members of the militia joined up from the viewpoint of a number of them recuperating, after the event, in hospital. After scene setting, with a newsreel about the Brotherhood and Unity (such irony runs throughout the film) tunnel first opened in the 1970s, most of the plot takes place 20 years later in the dilapidated and unfinished tunnel as the militia seek shelter from the Bosnian army. The main protagonist is Milan who, in pre-war years, ran a business with his Muslim mate.
Its complex structure focuses on a band of Bosnian-Serb militia who, amongst other things, burn Muslim villages.
The abomination of war is accentuated in civil war Pretty Village, Pretty Flame (original title translates better as Beautiful villages burn beautifully) covers the post-Yugoslavian war of the 1990s that foreshadowed the current ‘conflict’ between ‘the west’ and Muslims.