Sarajevo FF: Talk With Sinisa juricic

As part of the “Dealing With the Past” there was a talk with producer Siniša Juricic, who co-produced and was a character in “Chris, the Swiss”, a film that was taken to the Cannes Film Festival, a film not loved by Croatian film and tv authorities, they don’t like to see it as a film from Croatia, but not the only film that Juricic has made as a producer; he has not been able to get funding from the Croatian Audiovisual Fund for three years. He was service provider for the Danish production “15 Minutes. The Dvor Massacre” and for this he was “accused of being a traitor” and “blacklisted” at the Fund.

The talk had the long title “Working with films that tackle sensitive issuses from the past” and Juricic, well prepared, had brought along clips/trailers from his filmography: “Dead Man Walking”, “Velvet Terrorists”, the mentioned two films, “Houston, we have a Problem” as well as a clip from a new film about a cartoonist, who was killed by the partisans in Belgrade 1944. It looked very fascinating. Juricic, interviewed by Robert Zuber, said that he now “seriously considers to make comedies” – I don’t believe him having seen his talent as a producer not only for the mentioned films but also for fine works as “Cash and Marry”, one of my favourites from my time at the training programme Ex Oriente, and “Sofia’s Last Ambulance” that is a small masterpiece. What comes out of a talk like this is sadness, well anger that the Croatian film and tv authorities are so scared of anything that is controversial and finds it necessary to blacklist a talent like Juricic. At the discussion after “Srbenka”, the director Nebojša Slijepcevic was asked if the film would end up on Croatian television. With a smile, he said that this would not happen. Something is rotten, not only in the state of Denmark…