In the Docu Press Corner programme at the Festival Square, Rada Šešić, selector of the Competition Programme – Documentary Film, spoke with the crews of the films YUGO GOES TO AMERICA, DEAR ORCHID, WE SHALL LIVE TOGETHER, and GOOD PEOPLE.
The film JUGO IDE U AMERIKU is being screened out of competition. The directors spoke about the process of making the film. “We both come from fields that are not filmmaking. I’m a theatre and novel writer, while Aleksa is a director of photography, which was great because we didn’t collide at all. And we met just two months before our trip,” said director Filip Grujić. Aleksa explained that the film is about enjoying the journey itself: “The car is old and broke down a lot, which meant we got to meet a lot of people.” The crew also spoke about the status of the Yugo, which has become a pop-culture symbol in the United States. “For us in Serbia, it’s still a means of transport, but it’s also a relic,” Grujić said. The directors are currently working on a new project, and the film will continue its festival journey in Brač.
Hana Selena Sokolović’s DEAR ORCHID and Damir Markovina’s WE SHALL LIVE TOGETHER examine the lasting consequences of the 1990s wars. DEAR ORCHID follows the diary of Hana Selena Sokolović’s sister, who was 11 years old at the time, and documents the family’s displacement during the Siege of Sarajevo. On the other hand, WE SHALL LIVE TOGETHER turns the camera towards Markovina’s family. His father was a member of parliament who voted against the Dayton Peace Agreement. “I wanted to understand my father and my relationship to his decisions. It’s hard knowing when to stop being a son and step into the role of a filmmaker,” Markovina said.
Speaking about the consequences of the war, Sokolović emphasized that they are still not behind us: “Yes, it has been 30 years, but this is something we very much need to talk about.” For Markovina, too, the consequences of the war remain inseparable from everyday life. “Everything I live is an irreversible consequence of the war. The society we live in still hasn’t faced those consequences. I think it’s my obligation as a filmmaker to speak about this.” Markovina added that the war’s consequences transcend borders: “War is always the same for victims, no matter where they are from. And we should not stop talking about how evil people were, and how we should stop being that.”
The programme also presented GOOD PEOPLE, the latest film by Macedonian director Milcho Manchevski. The film examines the tragedy that occurred at a nightclub in Kočani, where 63 people died in a fire. Rather than focusing on the media perspective, the director sought to hear from those who risked their lives to save others. “I wanted to hear the stories firsthand. I made a film that is a bit ‘dry’ and musicless because I wanted it to be a document as well,” Manchevski said. He explained that his main interest was not in recreating the tragedy visually, but in discovering the inner beauty of those people: “I made a very austere and minimalist piece, yet it seems that the emotional aspect of it was still incredibly strong.
