It’s a good film. Not because of the theme (a mine is closed, miners are without job, what to do?) that is pretty much known. This time it takes place in Silesia, a region that has also been described before, mostly by Polish filmmakers – No, it is good because of the miner Tomas, who becomes the IT programmer Tomas. The director has followed Tomas for four years in his struggle to get a new education – his doubts, his warm realitionship to his children, his dating to find a new partner, his café talks with friends, his passion for Banik Ostrava, the football team he supports.

I write Tomas as I get close to him and his positive attitude to life. He is himself, when he is at interviews for IT Jobs, grounded and charming and funny, also when he talks to a full theater in Prague at a TED arrangement about him succeeding. It made me for a moment think “is this a corporate film” as it of course puts a positive light on the retraining program Tomas is part of. But why bother as this for once is a positive and authentic film. It is the director’s first film, well told (dramaturg is as always in Czech documentaries Jan Gogola) and being in both DOK Leipzig and Ji.hlava festivals is quite a good start!  

Czech Republic, 2020, 91 mins.

… Gevar, Natasha, Shevan. A family. From Syria, now living in France. English title: Gevar’s Land.

The joy of seeing something grow. Plants, vegetables – at home on the balcony and in the garden. In a scene Natasha looks at her phone and tells Gevar that a town in Syria is being bombed. They are in the garden, Gevar puts down his phone and talks about, when to plant garlic onions. Syria is far away and the two try to establish a new life in France. The gardening plays a key role in that respect. It is lovely to see Gevar drawing on a piece of paper, where to plant potatoes, radis, pumpkins, onions, parsley, coriander, okra…He is happy to be in France and expresses this, when the discussion unfolds among the Syrians at parties and gatherings. Where a friend says that he loves French literature but not to be in France! 

Qutaiba Barhamji follows the family over a year. He is behind the camera, he is close to the family but he does not interfer or asks questions. A clever solution, there are so many films that have been dealing with the tormented country. He is present, at their home and in the garden. He helps with some translation from French to Arabic and catches small but important situations. Which are actually identical to (I was thinking when watching), what my wife and I have experienced in our allotment garden : A neighbour who tells us « ignorants » how to do gardening OR the same neighbour informing us that there is a ban on watering the garden – in the film they water anyway, in our community we do the same. Come on, otherwise the garden will die!

Gevar and his family meet the (French) bureaucracy – nothing special, we have do so as well – the difference is, as he says so precisely, Gevar, that “I can’t control my dreams”, the thoughts he has brought along from Syria. Again the film is not going into this issue, not needed, a film comes from the screen to be formed in the head of a spectator.

We see the pumpkins and are happy on behalf of the family. Alas, they are robbed; the director stays respectfully at a distance, when Natasha breaks into tears, she cries, says the little boy. Gevar gets a job far away from the home and the garden, they talk about moving and giving up the garden. Gevar is taking down the barbecue installment he has built, he stands thoughtfully in the picture in the garden, he has to give up. Sounds like a sad ending, maybe, but there is also a wonderful scene towards the end, where Gevar comes home to Natasha and Shevan after being away for work. A scene full of love and happiness. They will manage their new life in their new country. I hope!

France, 78 mins., 2020

When you say A, you also have to say B. So here comes an edited versión of the press release of the ZagrebDox Special edition concerning, who were the lucky winners at the festival that ended last night:

In international competition the jury consisted of the award-winning Croatian documentary filmmaker Goran Dević, the Slovenian director, producer, teacher, artistic director and Makedox programmer Petra Seliškar, and the Czech director and photographer Anna Kryvenko. The main festival award, the Big Stamp, went to the film Froth (PHOTO) by Ilya Povolotskiy. “In a selection of 17 films, the jury was attracted by the minimalist portrayal of an isolated community in the direct film tradition. The director managed to discover the place and its history in today’s scenes of Murmansk,” said the jury. The special mention in this category went to the film Exemplary Behaviour by Audrius Mickevičius and Nerijus Milerius, with the following statement: “For an exceptional and dramatic personal approach to saying goodbye, collective revenge and systematic punishment turning a real life story into cinematic meditation. This film helps us understand the logic of the prison system, as well as people going through it, their lives, families and stories. The director himself faces issues with the system and has to find a way to come to terms with it.”

The Croatian journalist and editor Dean Šoša, the Italian set designer and 

director Valentina Primavera and the film producer and artistic director of Trieste Film Festival Nicoletta Romeo are the members of this year’s regional jury, which gave the Big Stamp to the film Acasa, My Home by Radu Ciorniciuc. “A sober portrayal of the troubles of the oppressed class without any embellishment, rhetoric or moral judgment, following the taxing and intimate journey of a big Romanian family from the wilderness of the Danube delta to the big city, from an idyllic natural landscape to the civilisation and possibility for a better future, at least for younger generations,” said the jury. A special mention went to the Croatian film One of Us by Đuro Gavran. “A narrative documentary demonstrating empathetic closeness with the protagonists, a group of friends whose 15th prom anniversary unmasks a brutal discovery, a coming-of-age story about monsters from the past and a new, wiser outlook on life,” said the jury statement.

ZagrebDox also awards the Small Stamp, an award to the filmmaker up to 35 years of age. This year the Young Jury consisted of the Dutch director and producer John Appel, the Belgrade-based editor, director and screenwriter Jelena Maksimović, and the Mediterranean Film Festival Split director and Cinema Network president Alen Munitić. The Small Stamp this year went to Radu Ciorniciuc, the director of Acasa, My Home, “for a powerful directorial debut opening up important questions about the modern world and speaking about a family who have to give up their home in the wilderness and integrate with the society in a unique, plausible and emotional way,” said the jury. A special mention in this category went to Ilya Povolotskiy, the director of Froth, “for an exceptional cinematic language bringing us close to people and their daily struggle on the shores of the Barents Sea.”

The My Generation Award, presented by the founder and director of ZagrebDox Nenad Puhovski to a filmmaker of his generation, went to the American Oscar winner Alex Gibney, whose latest film Citizen K was screened in The Best of the Rest section. 

The award of the International Film Critics’ Federation FIPRESCI, decided by the Macedonian film critic, writer and Kinenova festival programme director Igor Angjelkov, the Croatian film critic Marijana Jakovljević and the Latvian film critic Zane Balčus, went to the film Acasa, My Home by Radu Ciorniciuc. “For a film tackling many contemporary social issues: what kind of lifestyle to choose, what place to call home, how to adapt to new circumstances. Exploring these issues, the filmmakers open up space for the audience to think and form their own opinion. From a long observational process we are presented with a powerful story immersing us into the lives of the protagonists and giving us access to the key moments, highlighting emotional connection,” said the jury.

www.zagrebdox.net

Directed by Nikola Dragovic & Milutin Petrovic. Based primarily on VHS-tapes recorded by Predrag Bata Miloševic with Igor Dikic (Goga) as the protagonist.

A soldier’s story. Could be anywhere, any soldier. A young man’s story. Seen from today, 30 years later. Universal when you think about the film as I did after two screenings. Because even if I have been visiting Serbia once a year during the last 15-16 years, and have heard about/seen films about the end of Yugoslavia and the war and conflicts, there are many details referring to battles and geography that I know too little about. And yet I would argue that this is a universal human story. For you to know before reading this positive review…

Positive because it is well constructed and emotional, because it shows the crazyness of war and what – in this case – a young man of 19 years drafted for the Yugoslav National Army in 1990 had to go through.

The scoop is that his uncle , who presents himself in the film, Predrag Bata Miloševic, is a dedicated cameraman, who filmed Goga when he was drafted for the army. Actually before that very day… 

The film starts with footage of the whole family saying goodbye to the young man, what a party, he gets (sorry for my French) pissed and the scenes are full of this strange atmosphere of not knowing what will happen; including worry as does the mother shows so clearly – she is a very important person in the film.

The cameraman, he is called Bata, follows him and the family to the ceremony, where the soldiers give their pledge to the nation and the flag…

30 years later Goga sits in his armchair looking at himself – as does his mother. They comment on what was filmed then AND what was filmed in 1992, again in an interview with Bata, after he had served the army for three years. That’s where the horror stories start. He was in Varazdin in the Republic of Croatia, where the Yugoslav National Army had bases and where they got into battles with the Croats at the time, where the neighbouring country Slovenia close to Varazdin had already declared their independence from Yugoslavia. Goga tells what happened, how he and others got out, how others had surrendered, how he got back to Belgrade, was accused of being a traitor, beaten up and sent back to army duty– and how he suffered, when it was all over and he was back with the family. Nightmares – he stuttered when he came back, says the mother.

In the film Goga goes back to the barracks and to Varazdin and meets with a Bosnian lieutenant who was the only one taking care of the soldiers – «the kids» as Radimir Cacic says in the film (Wikipedia: In the Battle of the Barracks, Cacic led the September 1991 negotiations with the Yugoslav People’s Army to abandon the Varadin barracks). 

How do you see the young man (himself) on the tapes 30 years ago? «He is lost», Goga says. And he is not the only one, the only soldier who has gone through horrible times. But not many have an uncle, who has followed along with a camera. It is amazing material put together in a fine way – pacifistic , mingling the story with absurd Yugoslav army propaganda films to stress the absurdity.

Serbia, 2020, 86 mins.