#Mila Turajlic

[julietsha]

Ciné-guerrilas - scènes des archive Labudovic de Mila Turajlic (2022)

[kartaprticek]

The Other Side of Everything (2017)

Director & Writer: Mila Turajlic

Stars: Srbijanka Turajlic, Mila Turajlic, Mira Boskic

[lamiaprigione]

Cinema Komunisto (2010)

[sysk-ehess]

MILA TURAJLIĆ

Mercredi 6 décembre 2017

De 19h à 21h à la MSH, 16-18 rue Suger 75006 Paris (Métro Odéon ou Saint-Michel)

Mila Turajlić est une documentariste venant de Belgrade (Serbie). Son premier film en tant que réalisatrice en 2010, Cinema Komunisto, a été présenté au Festival International du Film Documentaire d’Amsterdam (IDFA) et au festival de Tribeca. Il a reçu seize prix, dont le Hugo d’Or au Festival International de Films de Chicago. Le documentaire retrace l'histoire de la compagnie nationale de cinéma yougoslave Avala Films, créée par Tito pour se réfléchir au sein de l’histoire du cinéma, et construit, à partir d’entretiens et archives du cinéma yougoslave, un « film sur un pays qui n’existe plus ». Il a été présenté en France, au Royaume-Uni et en ex-Yougoslavie. Son deuxième film The Other Side Of Everything est la première coproduction européenne de la chaîne HBO avec la Serbie, également coproduit par la compagnie française Survivance. Il a été présenté au dernier Festival de Cinéma International de Toronto en 2017 et vient d’obtenir le prix IDFA à Amsterdam du meilleur long-métrage documentaire. Le titre représente littéralement une porte verrouillée de l’appartement Srbijanka Turajlić, où celle-ci a grandi et vit encore. Srbijanka Turajlić, la mère de l’artiste, est une célèbre professeure de l’université de Belgrade et une activiste politique, qui fut aussi le symbole des manifestations étudiantes contre le régime impitoyable de Milosevic. En 1946, après l’établissement du gouvernement communiste en ex-Yougoslavie, l’appartement familial fut divisé pour héberger d’autres familles. Le documentaire commence alors que les deux portes du salon fermées depuis 70 ans (même après la dissolution du régime communiste et de la Yougoslavie) font place nette.

Mila Turajlić est une ancienne étudiante du programme de formation Eurodoc, destiné aux professionnels européens du secteur documentaire, du Berlin Talent Campus et du Discovery Campus. Elle enseigne au sein de l’équipe pédagogique d’Archidoc, organisme français chargé du développement de projets de films originaux dans leur approche des archives et d’aider leurs réalisateurs·trices à accéder au marché international du film documentaire. Elle enseigne aussi au Centre documentaire des Balkans. En 2005, Mila Turajlić a créé le Magnificent Seven Film Festival de films documentaires européens à Belgrade et a été la première présidente de DokSerbia, l’association des cinéastes documentaires qu’elle a co-fondée.

[EN] Mila Turajlić is a documentary filmmaker born in Belgrade, Yugoslavia, in 1979. Her 2010 directorial debut, CINEMA KOMUNISTO, premiered at IDFA in Amsterdam and Tribeca Film Festival, and went on to win 16 awards including the Gold Hugo at the Chicago Int’l Film Festival in 2011, and the FOCAL Award for Creative Use of Archival Footage. Cinema Komunisto has also become part of the teaching curriculum at a number of US universities. The film explored the ruins of Yugoslavia’s communist regime through the old state-run film industry and through collected memories about cinephile dictator Tito (who watched a film every night). Mila’s second film « The Other Side of Everything » premiered at the 2017 Toronto Film Festival, and just won the IDFA Award for Best Feature-Length Documentary. It is a documentary on Serbia’s history, in relation to the themes of memory and time. The title literally represents a locked doorway in Srbijanka Turajlić's Belgrade apartment where she grew up and still lives. Srbijanka Turajlić, who is director’s mother, is an acclaimed professor at the University of Belgrade and political activist, once a symbol of student protests against ruthless Milosevic’s regime. In 1946, after the establishment of communist government in former Yugoslavia, the apartment complex that belonged to Srbijanka's family was divided across to accommodate other families. The documentary opens with her cleaning the two locked doors in the living room which hasn’t been opened for seven decades (even after the dissolution of communist regime and Yugoslavia).

Mila is an alum of EURODOC and teaches workshops on filmmaking at Archidoc (La Fémis) and Balkan Documentary Workshop. She produces the Magnificent 7 Film Festival of European Feature Documentary Film in Belgrade since it’s creation in 2005, and is a founding member and first president of DOKSerbia. Mila is a graduate of the London School of Economics and holds a Ph.D. from the University of Westminster. She is currently in production on a documentary film about the recently deceased Stevan Labudovic, the cameraman of President Tito, who filmed the birth of the Non-Aligned Movement.

Programmation et prochains rendez-vous sur ce site ou par abonnement à la newsletter : somethingyoushouldknow-request@ehess.fr

Pour regarder les séminaires antérieurs : http://www.vimeo.com/sysk/

Séminaire conçu et organisé par Patricia Falguières, Elisabeth Lebovici et Natasa Petresin-Bachelez et soutenu par la Fundación Almine y Bernard Ruiz-Picasso para el Arte.

[mariacallous]

Srbijanka Turajlic, a retired professor from the University of Belgrade and a well-known liberal political activist, died on Sunday at the age of 77, announced the opposition Free Citizens Movement, which she co-founded.

“It is with immense sadness that we say goodbye to our Srbijanka Turajlic. Her ideas, politics and desire to make Serbia a modern society will forever remain the cornerstone of our organisation,” the Free Citizens Movement said in a statement.

Turajlic, born in 1946, was one of the most vocal opponents of Serbian authoritarian leader Slobodan Milosevic in the 1990s and a member of the Otpor (Resistance) movement that campaigned against his rule.

After Milosevic was ousted in 2000, she served in the Ministry of Higher Education and Sport as an assistant minister from 2001 to 2004.

She was also known as a critic of Serbia’s current president, Aleksandar Vucic. In 2017, she said that it was shameful to have a president who said that “100 Muslims will be killed for every murdered Serb”, a statement made by Vucic during the Bosnian war in the 1990s.

Turajlic was the subject of an award-winning documentary film directed by her daughter Mila Turajlic called ‘The Other Side of Everything’, which showed how political turmoil in Serbia affected their family.

Turajlic graduated from the Faculty of Electrical Engineering in Belgrade in 1969, received her master’s degree in 1973 and her doctorate in 1979.

She studied in Grenoble, France on a scholarship from the French government from 1974 to 1975 and worked as a lecturer from 1984 to 1986 in Monterey, California.

She was the author of more than 100 scientific works in the field of management and higher education, published in domestic and international magazines, but also the author of two textbooks and co-author of one that entered state curriculum.

She retired from the University of Belgrade in 2011 but was politically active until the end, supporting the opposition Free Citizens Movement.

In 2009, she was awarded the Osvajanje Slobode (Winning Freedom) prize by the Maja Marsicevic Tasic Fund for her contribution to the victory of democracy in Serbia.

In 2017, she signed the Declaration on the Common Language of the Croats, Serbs, Bosniaks and Montenegrins, a public statement declaring that Bosnian, Croatian, Montenegrin and Serbian are all variations of the same language, which annoyed conservatives.

[k-r-a-s-o-t-aa]

guys please go watch “the other side of everything/druga strana svega” by mila turajlic. potentially one of the best documentaries i have ever seen she is amazing!!! 

[andrikonic]

[lookerweekly]

Uoči premijere Mila Turajlić i Vladimir Tomčić, direktor Filmskih novosti predstavili su rad na ovom dokumentarnom diptihu. Mila Turajlić je objasnila da je ideja za film nastala 2009. godine u Alžiru.

| LookerWeekly

https://lookerweekly.com/film/mila-turajlic/

[documentaryoncinema]

Documentales, 19

‘Necessary Evil: Super-Villains of DC Comics’, Scott Devine, J.M. Kenny, 2013, VOSE.

Los malvados y muchas veces carismáticos villanos de DC Comics son analizados por guionistas, directores, actores y responsables de la editorial.

‘The New cinema’, Gary Young, Michael Heilemann, 1968, VO. 

Entre la Nouvelle Vague y el neorrealismo italiano, Europa había sido objeto de una transformación continua en cine desde la década de los 50, mientras el sistema de estudios en América gimió bajo su propio peso e inercia. Un nuevo Hollywood había llegado con ‘Bonnie y Clyde’ en 1967, y ya en 1968 se pensó cambiar la forma narrativa.��

De acuerdo con la descripción en YouTube aparentemente el documental nunca se emitió en televisión, ofrece una mirada fascinante a cineastas jóvenes de finales de los 60 y entrevistas de Gene Youngblood con George Lucas, que proporcionan un aspecto sobre su temprana carrera y la determinación de rebelarse contra las fuerzas dominantes de Hollywood.

Con la presencia de Peter Fonda, Dustin Hoffman, Roman Polanski y Sharon Tate, Andy Warhol, Francis Ford Coppola y George Lucas entre otros.

‘William S. Burroughs: A man within’, Yony Leyser, 2010, VOSE.

Sobre William S. Burroughs de la vida y la obra del que fue calificado como el mayor exponente de la contracultura americana.

Narrado por el actor Peter Weller, con imágenes de archivo inéditas hasta el momento y numerosas entrevistas a amigos y artistas como Iggy Pop, Patti Smith, Genesis P-Orridge, John Waters, Gus Van Sant y David Cronenberg entre otros.

‘Milius’, Joey Figueroa, Zak Knutson, 2013, VE.

Sobre la historia de uno de los directores y productores más controvertidos de la historia de Hollywood, John Milius. Desde sus aspiraciones infantiles por unirse al ejército hasta su abandono de la industria del cine por sus creencias radicales y comportamiento volátil, Milius ha dejado un trabajo legendario en películas como 'Apocalypse now’, 'Tiburón’, 'Conan el bárbaro’ o 'Harry el sucio’.

Cuenta con la participación de él mismo, Charlie Sheen, James Earl Jones, Sam Elliott, Ed O'Neill, William Katt, George Hamilton, Kurt Sutter, Randal Kleiser, Lorenzo di Bonaventura, Bob Gale, Paul Schrader, Bryan Singer, Oliver Stone, Kathleen Kennedy, Matthew Weiner, Harrison Ford, Sylvester Stallone, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Richard Dreyfuss, Steven Spielberg, Clint Eastwood, Martin Scorsese, Francis Ford Coppola, Robert Zemeckis y George Lucas entre otros.

‘Cinema komunisto’, Mila Turajlic, 2010, VO.

Aunque Yugoslavia haya desaparecido como país, todavía existe en las películas: por ello se convirtió en una nación puramente cinematográfica.

De ello trata el documental que narra casi cincuenta años de la construcción de una identidad nacional a través del cine.

Desde un exhaustivo rastreo de archivos, la directora serbia Mila Turajlic logró narrar toda la dimensión épica de la República Federal Socialista de Yugoslavia, centrándose especialmente en el afán cinéfilo de Josip Broz, el Mariscal Tito, primer ministro entre 1963 y 1980, contada por su proyectorista privado, un personaje extraordinario llamado Leka Konstantinovic.

Con cameos antológicos de Alfred Hitchcock y Orson Welles, esta historia del cine yugoslavo es un álbum completo del apogeo del género bélico en su máxima versión antinazi, una cronología sobre la megalómana pulsión de producción que supera cualquier verosímil y, sobre todo, un catálogo lujoso de la grandeza aventurera perdida del cine industrial.

‘Easy riders, raging bulls: How the sex, drugs and rock 'n�� roll generation saved Hollywood' (‘Moteros tranquilos, toros salvajes: Como la generación del sexo, drogas y rock ‘n’ roll cambió Hollywood' - ‘La generación que cambió Hollywood. Easy riders, raging bulls’), Kenneth Bowser, 2003, VO - VOSE.

Basado en el libro con el mismo título de Peter Biskind sobre la generación de directores que dominó el cine estadounidense en los años 70.

Con la participación de Coppola, Scorsese, Bogdanovich, Arthur Penn y Peckinpah entre otros.

'La verdadera historia de Fiebre del sábado noche', Anthony Uro, 2010, VOSE.

‘Rewind this!’, Josh Johnson, 2013, VOSE.

“Rebobine, por favor.

Los cambios tecnológicos en los dispositivos de consumo audiovisual han tenido un gran impacto en la manera de ver, conservar y realizar cine, televisión y otras formas de la comunicación audiovisual. La actual revolución digital del cine se vio en cierto modo prefigurada por el impacto que produjo en los primeros ochenta la consolidación del vídeo doméstico.

El documental ’Rewind This!’, dirigido por Josh Johnson, 2013, que pudo verse en el pasado Festival de Sitges y que ha tenido un pase reciente en el canal especializado en cine TCM, es una oda al VHS. En una estructura clásica de documental divulgativo, Rewind This! presenta a lo largo de su metraje a una serie de personalidades singulares cuya vida, trabajo o forma de pensar y sentir el audiovisual se han visto marcados por el VHS. Son coleccionistas cuya máxima pasión es escarbar en ignotos mercadillos en busca de piezas olvidadas por el tiempo, cineastas independientes, empresarios avispados que supieron ver la revolución que se acercaba, o aficionados de la vibrante escena de Austin, Texas, cuna de algunas de las más estimulantes convulsiones en la cinefilia contemporánea. Todos estos personajes insisten con sus testimonios, opiniones y análisis en la idea de que la consolidación del VHS como soporte para el consumo audiovisual a lo largo de los primeros años ochenta del siglo XX supuso una serie de cambios notabilísimos que cambiaron radicalmente el panorama del cine y que fueron, sin duda, el detonante de las condiciones que dan forma a la actual era de hiperinflación de vídeo.

En primer lugar, el VHS fue la piedra angular del cambio de nuestra relación con la televisión, al introducir la posibilidad de lo que se conoce en el ámbito especializado como time shifting (grabar los programas de televisión para verlos en un horario más conveniente). De hecho, puede decirse que el VHS nació, quizá no como tecnología, pero sí como producto de consumo, para grabar televisión. Pero la liberación del sometimiento al horario de emisión (que, en realidad, tampoco parecía una reivindicación mayoritaria) no fue la única consecuencia. Esa capacidad de registro para el visionado diferido se traduciría, también, en una capacidad de archivo, lo que acabaría teniendo un impacto sensible en los cinéfilos, al crear las condiciones para generar colecciones cinematográficas particulares.

Algo más tarde llegaría la otra gran transformación provocada por el VHS: la popularización del consumo doméstico de películas. Rewind This! narra aquel momento fundacional en el que Andre Blay solicitó a las majors los derechos de explotación de sus películas en formato de cinta magnética doméstica. Todas las majors declinaron excepto Fox. Pero la realidad se impuso, y pocos meses después, las grandes productoras-distribuidoras habían creado sus propios sellos de vídeo, iniciando así la transformación más profunda que la industria de los contenidos audiovisuales haya tenido en su historia. Para entender la magnitud de tal cambio, baste pensar en dos fenómenos. El primero es la importancia que desde entonces han tenido los beneficios por explotación de vídeo doméstico en la cuenta de resultados de cualquier major. El segundo es la irrupción en el ecosistema industrial del audiovisual de nuevas prácticas empresariales y nuevos enfoques del negocio. El productor, director y guionista Charles Band, máximo responsable de la que fuera una de las más destacables productoras independientes de los años ochenta (Empire Pictures), reflexiona sobre este fenómeno de forma muy clara en Rewind This!, cuando explica que, aunque las diferencias de presupuesto entre Terminator 2 y su producción Puppet Master fueran enormes, ambas ocupaban en el videoclub el mismo espacio y luchaban por el mismo público. En la época del dominio incuestionable del blockbuster en las salas de cine, los videoclubes fueron una saludable ampliación del campo de batalla para la competencia entre productoras y distribuidoras y el caldo de cultivo para la eclosión de toda clase de cineastas independientes. Aún más, el concepto de cineasta independiente amplió sus límites notablemente, para incluir a realizadores de guerrilla armados con una cámara doméstica.

Estas líneas han comenzado apuntando que las transformaciones que produjo el VHS prefiguraron el momento actual de la cultura del vídeo. Quizá se entienda mejor diciéndolo de otro modo: hay mucha menos distancia en el salto del VHS a la combinación de vídeo digital e Internet, que en el salto del cine doméstico en formato Super8 al VHS. En la actualidad, aunque no haya desaparecido el evento televisivo en directo, el time shifting es una práctica casi generalizada, el consumo en casa es ya la forma privilegiada de ver cine y la producción amateur vive su minuto de oro gracias a la combinación de los millones de cámaras de vídeo disponibles en toda clase de dispositivos y los servicios de alojamiento de Internet. Y lo que creó las condiciones para ese cambio tecnológico y cultural fue el VHS.

Y ahora viene lo que para el autor de estas líneas es la coda triste de la historia: más de dos décadas después del momento de gloria del VHS, los amantes del cine doméstico en formato físico nos vemos obligados a batirnos en retirada. El streaming, el VOD y las descargas, tanto legales como alegales o ilegales, se convertirán definitivamente en las formas habituales (si no las únicas) de consumo cinematográfico en casa, dejando nuestras estanterías de discos (dvd y blu-ray) como reliquias. Pero, y pido disculpas por el exceso de terminología militar, después de la retirada viene la guerra de guerrillas. No debería resultar extraño, por tanto, que algunos de esos amantes, convertidos en guerrilleros, hayan comenzado a rebobinar la Historia, reivindicando aquellas cajas de sueños hechas de cinta magnética envuelta en enormes y poco prácticas cantidades de plástico.”

Publicado originalmente en COMeIN. Revista dels Estudis de Ciències de la Informació i de la Comunicació de la UOC, 27 (noviembre de 2013) por Jordi Sánchez Navarro, investigador y profesor de comunicación (UOC). Programador en Anima’t de Sitges Festival Internacional de Cinema Fantàstic de Catalunya.

‘Perdidos en La Mancha’ ('Lost in La Mancha’), Keith Fulton, Louis Pepe, 2002, VOSE.

En 2000 Terry Gilliam intentó llevar (ABC.es) El Quijote a la gran pantalla en un proyecto titulado 'El Hombre que Mató a Don Quijote'. Sin embargo una serie de desgracias para la historia del cine hace que nos tengamos que conformar con el documental sobre el rodaje de éste magnífico sueño de Gilliam en España que ahora piensa reanudar.

En el puede verse como los técnicos se desesperarán por el modo de trabajar de Gilliam, una mente caótica y genial donde hierve una imaginación desbordante, y por los accidentes, lluvias y productores intransigentes.

'American movie’, Chris Smith, 1999, VO.

Sobre Mark Borchardt, un aspirante a director de cine que trata de financiar el proyecto de sus sueños y poder así terminar de rodar su película, de terror y de bajo presupuesto que había abandonado años atrás. Wikipedia.

[atarimcgregor]

My 2018 in film watching

I did the thing were I wrote down every movie I saw over the year.

On the whole, I watched 158 films (that’s 32 more than the last time I did this). And I made some effort to watch more diverse films then I’m used to.

The vast majority of them were English-language ones (of course), but 30 were in other languages. Of those, 10 were Icelandic, 5 French, 4 Japanese and 2 Italian.

Almost half the films were from the current decade, but around 15% were from before 1980, with the oldest from 1939.

I put more emphasis on some of my more neglected genres, and saw 17 horror movies, and 9 documentaries.

A few films I saw for the first time that I can definitely recommend are: Chronicle of a Summer (Edgar Morin and Jean Rouch, 1961), For a Few Dollars More (Sergio Leone, 1965), Come and See (Elem Klimov, 1985), 13 Assassins (Miike Takashi, 2010), Me and Earl and the Dying Girl (Alfonso Gomez-Rejon, 2015), Under the Tree (Hafsteinn Gunnar Sigurðsson, 2017) and The Other Side of Everything (Mila Turajlic, 2017).

And a couple I recommend staying away from: MASH (Robert Altman, 1970) and Justice League (Zack Snyder, 2017).

[julietsha]

Cinéma Komunisto de Mila Turajlic (2011)

[scannain]

#EuropeanCinema: Woman at War awarded the 2018 LUX Film Prize

#EuropeanCinema: Woman at War awarded the 2018 LUX Film Prize. David Deignan reports from last week's ceremony

The European Parliament last week announced Benedikt Erlingsson’s Woman at War as the winner of the 2018 LUX Film Prize. The comedy-drama – an international co-production between Iceland, France and Ukraine – beat off stiff competition from Wolfgang Fischer’s Styx and Mila Turajlic’s The Other Side of Everything.

Woman at War, Erlingsson’s second feature as writer/director, blends absurdist…

[falloperlasignoragrassa]

Sé stessi come vetrina di altri sé.

[mrmichaelchadler]

RIFF 2018: Welcome to Sodom, Over the Limit, Daughter’s Table

If there’s any lesson I plan on gleaning from my time in Iceland, it is to stop hurrying and allow life to move at a slower pace. So laid-back was the waitress at Reykjavík’s Lebowski Bar that I had to chase her down in order to pay my bill. It wasn’t that she was busy, it was that she just didn’t seem all that interested in money. A quartet of Icelandic friends passed the time by quoting “Good Burger” at their table, while Mike Judge’s “Idiocracy” played on a large screen nearby. I had never seen Judge’s 2006 dystopian satire before, and though the volume was off, I found the film’s opening moments to be laugh-out-loud funny and unnervingly prescient, even in their subtitled form. Its slapstick portrayal of a “garbage avalanche” foreshadowed the actual one that killed 17 people in Mozambique a mere decade later, and its hellish imagery isn’t all that far removed from the apocalyptic scenery on display in Christian Krönes and Florian Weigensamer’s Austrian documentary, “Welcome to Sodom.” 

Ranking high among the most visually arresting achievements at the 2018 Reykjavík International Film Festival, this impeccably lensed picture takes an unflinching look at the place where our laptops and smartphones will likely end up—a sprawling waste dump in Ghana populated by 6,000 men, women and children. Strewn throughout the rubble are familiar items that had once been commonplace in American homes, such as bulky computer monitors. The sheer wastefulness of our quickly outdated machines currently cluttering a site previously comprised of untouched swampland is enough to make one’s blood boil. By creating technology built to not last but be replaced by newer, more expensive models, we have left a toxic heap of debris for people in impoverished corners of the world to clean up. Cinematographer Christian Kermer opens the picture with a 360 degree panoramic view of the vile landscape, stretching as far as the eye can see. The low hum of the brooding score is so evocative of Paul Schrader’s ode to impending environmental catastrophe, “First Reformed,” that I half-expected to see Ethan Hawke’s tormented priest floating above the mountains of discarded tires. Anonymous inhabitants speak in voice-overs juxtaposed against the footage, each providing an eye-opening perspective on how mankind manages to survive in an environment plagued with disease (at one point, a group of guys perform cathartic dance moves that cause spirals of ash to soar from the ground). 

As a fiery preacher spews homophobic rhetoric, a man privately reflects on how his identity as a gay man derailed his chances for a successful career, despite being at the top of his class in medical school. With Ghana’s president voicing his desire to behead homosexuals, this scholar-turned-outcast has resigned himself to a life of self-imposed alienation. For him, the dump is a “temporary safe house” where he won’t be able to run the risk of having anyone get to know him on an intimate level. A more extroverted subject makes his living from breaking down broken appliances so that he can gather their basic properties—copper, iron, zinc—ripe for sale. He admits that the location is good for business despite being bad for humanity. The most haunting narration comes from a child who recalls how mankind’s disrespect of the land has left the gods angry—or, according to Werner Herzog, “monumentally indifferent.” As its last third grows increasingly repetitious, it’s clear “Welcome to Sodom” could’ve worked equally well as a short film. It’s not on the same level as the best documentaries screening at the festival—including Bing Liu’s “Minding the Gap,” Roger Michell’s “Tea with the Dames,” Alexandria Bombach’s “On Her Shoulders” and Mila Turajlic’s Lux Prize nominee, “The Other Side of Everything”—yet there is considerable worth in its extended length. Like the chameleon that haunts the hypnotic title sequence, the film takes its time, moving slowly enough to let us fully absorb the details of our world that we’d normally choose to overlook.

“There’s no such thing as a healthy professional athlete!” claims gymnast-turned-coach Amina Zaripova, spouting one of the numerous quotable if morally questionable lines in Polish director Marta Prus’ documentary, “Over the Limit.” Examining the relentless emotional and psychological abuse endured by Margarita “Rita” Mamun, the celebrated Russian Olympian in individual rhythmic gymnastics, this film causes one to question if her success occurred as a result of—or in spite of—her coaches’ bullying tactics. No tangible evidence is offered as to whether head coach Irina Viner’s mean-spirited demeanor punctuated by four-letter words had any discernible impact on Mamun’s performance, apart from elevating her stress level through the roof. This may be in part because Prus has little interest in the actual gymnastics, providing only fragmentary glances at the routines while keeping Mamun’s pivotal triumph at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics entirely offscreen. The director’s focus is kept primarily on the 20-year-old subject’s pained expression as she is alternately called a “silly cow” and “brave girl,” depending on how much her effort impresses the coaches. Never mincing her words for the camera, Viner approaches her job like a drill sergeant, believing that athletes cannot be truly built up unless they are broken down. Just as I began likening her in my mind to Parker Posey and Michael Hitchcock’s unstable couple in “Best in Show,” Viner exclaimed, “She’s not wound up! We need to train her like a dog.” 

If anything, Mamun appears all-too frenzied in her early routines, lacking the slinky self-assurance of her peer and rival, Yana Alexeyevna Kudryavtseva, whose joy is palpable as she dances to Jessica Rabbit’s crooning rendition of “Why Don’t You Do Right?” Viner is correct in assessing that Mamun’s greatest obstacle stems from her mental state, but doesn’t seem to realize that her own schoolyard putdowns have only further damaged the athlete’s confidence. There are shades of the obsessive theatre director from “Madeline’s Madeline” in how Viner violates the young woman’s personal struggles by contorting them into her artistry. Taking advantage of the cancer diagnosis that has hospitalized Mamun’s father—whom we see the gymnast chatting with on a heartrending phone call—Viner orders her to channel the grief prompted by her “dying dad” into the performance. When Zaripova attempts to show affection for Mamun, she is immediately chastised by Viner. In an ideal world, the notion of an entire country’s well-being hinging on the medals it gains in an Olympic contest would be immediately expunged. The undue pressure it places on athletes like Mamun is criminal, and if there’s anything worth cheering about in this picture, it is the athlete’s heroic composure amidst adversity. After hearing one-too-many disparaging expletives from Viner, streamed into the practice room via a monitor, Mamun tosses her ribbon on the ground and walks out of the gym, much to the protestations of her coach. It’s in that moment, more than any other, where she appears primed to win the gold. 

The coveted Golden Egg prize is awarded to the best short film at Reykjavík’s film festival, and I’ve been fortunate enough to view three of the worthy contenders. Tomas Leach’s intriguingly titled “Alba: Not Everyone Will Be Taken Into the Future,” is also about a young athlete—in this case, an aspiring dancer—though its style is more in line with “Welcome to Sodom,” allowing the recorded voice of its subject to anchor its assemblage of near-wordless footage. At age 16, the titular girl is already facing the perils of pushing her body to the limit, keeping up with her classes at Spain’s Corella Dance Academy despite a conspicuous pain in her legs. There are no tidy solutions to any of Alba’s lingering questions, as she ponders whether life is simply testing her to see how much she can take. Leach’s vignette recalls how the closure we seek in adulthood never existed in our youth, which was often consumed with a sense of discomfort as our future hung preciously in the air. Another highlight is Hakan Ünal’s Turkish submission, “Crack in the Wall,” a chillingly bleak look at a night-shift janitor’s futile pursuit of spiritual repentance. Wracked with guilt after awakening from an erotic dream, the man bathes himself as the camera stares down at him in stark judgment. Though the film initially seems to be a portrait of sexual repression, a final twist—deftly conveyed by the recurring image of red fingernails—affirms that a much darker sin has been committed.

Easily my favorite short I’ve seen in Reykjavík also happens to be the festival’s unlikeliest crowd-pleaser. South Korean director Heui Son’s 18-minute gem, “Daughter’s Table,” follows three adult sisters as they rush to their mother’s side after receiving news of her ill health. While together, they find themselves falling prone to the same sibling rivalry that characterized their upbringing. This premise would be compelling enough if handled as a straightforward drama, yet Son’s picture takes the form of an exuberant musical comedy, with the sisters breaking into song as they vie for their mother’s approval. The childlike spirit of the piece is appropriate, considering how nothing brings out a grown-up’s inner kid quite like visiting a former home marked by lines on the wall that had previously measured one’s pint-sized height. A trio of girls portraying the younger versions of the sisters are each represented by a bright color that corresponds with their teddy bears spotted in the background. The bouncy music and pleasingly unpolished choreography make this film a complete delight, carrying traces of the poignance perhaps best expressed during the finale of Isao Takahata’s masterpiece, “Only Yesterday.” How Son goes about resolving the mother’s storyline as she's surrounded by her children is an indelible example of pure cinema. Rather than treat difficult subject matter with the heavy hand of a morose dirge, Son crafts a celebration of life, encouraging us to savor the time we share with loved ones, as well as the memories destined to last for generations. 

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[27timescinema]

INTERVIEW - LUX PRIZE - MILA TURAJLIC

By Iassen Atanassov (pics © Giornate degli Autori)

Mila Turajlić is a young and creative Serbian filmmaker bestly known for her documentary movies Cinema Komunisto and The Other Side of Everything. The second one was chosen among many other European films to be part of the LUX Prize finalists this year, and was screened during the 75th Venice Film Festival. The film shows the story of Mila’s mother, Srbijanka Turajlić, focusing on her personal and political fights against the different regimes that ruled over Serbia during the past decades, as well as her dedication to her country. The film has received many awards all around the world, including the 2017 IDFA award for Best Feature-Lenght documentary. While she was in Venice I was lucky to have the chance to meet her for a quick interview.

Can you imagine fighting for something during your whole life, without leaving your country, like your mother did?

It is very, very hard for me to think that when I am her age I will be like that. I think that everybody in our coutry has a decision to face - wether to see the world and search for opportunities or to stay in their own country and deal with its problems. I haven't actually decided yet, but I am facing this choice and it is really hard. It is even harder when you have someone in front of you who has made such an honorable choice. In some ways she is giving me a legacy and I am like: "No, I don't want it”. I don't think that she ever questioned her desicion. Whatever happens she stays and whatever happens she fights. 

How long was the shooting process for the movie?

5 years of intense shooting. I worked on this film from 2012 to 2017, but some footage is from 2005. This was going to be my first movie and I started working on it in 2005. A few months later I realised that I didn't know how to make it. I wasn't old enough, I wasn't mature enough. So I dropped it and made another film. When I finished with that one I came back to The Other Side of Everything. Actually, when she is cleaning the silver in the film it is from two different years put together in on scene, because she does this once a year.

How would you explain this kind of "Balkan syndrome" concerning politics? Why do we always choose the same people we are complaining about? We make revolutions and then nothing changes.

I think it has to do with the process of falling in love with a politician. Someone appears as the "Messiah" and people believe in him. I also thought that it was a thing from the Balkans, but then I realised that it isn't happening only there. Not at all. It is much bigger than that. I visited a lot of countries with my film and I saw that we are not the only ones going through this at some point of our history. The media can create so much hysteria towards a person in order to make people love him and see him as a hero. On the other hand, politicians really know how to lie and we fall for this every time. It is a very troubling thing.

Do you believe the situation will ever be good? Could we eventually live happy and in peace? 

Do you remember the scene where my mother is telling me that I should continue her fight for this idea and find solutions? She is talking to all of us actually. The unpleasant thing is that we are the ones that should make this world a better place. Our generation has the responsibility now, even if we don't want to take it. 

Do you remember how was the situation when you were a child or did your mother tried to hide all of this from you in order to protect you? 

We were very mature. When there was no more food left, me and my sister clearly knew what was going on. We learned from our mother about being very transperant and open about what we were doing, particularly when resisting a regime. She would always have conversations on the phone in front of us, because when you start hiding something you put yourself in danger. I knew very much what was going on but I don't think I realised when I was a child how unique it was what she was doing. It was only when I reached this age, around the age my mother was at that time, that I am begining to think: "What were you doing? Where did you get the idea?". 

Did you have any issues while mixing job with family? Wasn't it strange for you? How did you manage?

At the beginning it was awkward for both of us. She didn't really think that I was ever going to finish this film, and I never really told her that she was going to be the main character. The truth is that you have to be very patient. I filmed her for 5 years, and one of the reasons it took me so long is because my mother is a professor. She is used to giving lectures, so she was talking to me like I was a journalist instead of her daughter. It took me a long time to make her understand, and I got quite angry some times. Then I started thinking: “Okay, I need to direct the context in between”. So I tried a lot of different things. I tried showing her the archive, to set her in a different mood, but it didn't really work. You have to be super patient, because you have to go through the phase when she thinks that she is giving an interview. Then she gets tired and the real conversation begins. The only way to make people relaxed in front of the camera is to give them time.

Were there any parts of the film that became too emotional to include in the final cut? 

The hardest scene for me, that is actually in the film, is when we are both crying. I filmed it by accident. We were in a conversation, the camera kept rolling and then we had this "moment". I only saw it in the rush afterwards. At the beginning I thought it was too intimate, but because of how it was filmed - you don't see her face - I thought I could use it. When we watched the final cut without the scene I knew that it was necessary. If it hadn't been filmed discretely, I would have never put that scene on the film. 

Have you ever had any fights with your mother about politics because of the generation gap?

I grew up following her life so we have very simillar views, but I loved using all these moments when you see her fighting with her friends. I really like this idea that you have friends from your childhood who have completely different beliefs and thinking and still be friends and playing cards. I thought that this was something really important to show. 

Where does your dissapointment come from?

We had a very good chance, we were protesting for so many years and then we had this revolution. We ‘achieved’ what we wanted and then woke up the next morning and realised that it is actually very easy to be a protestor, being against something. But when you finally have the power to build, what do you build? That is where my disappointment comes from. We had the chance and we didn't know what to do with it. I am very reluctant to be a protestor now because nothing really changes, even if it works. 

Why do you think your mother is more optimistic than you? 

I think it has to do with her personality. Sometimes I think that she is very naiv. She was a student in 1968 and she grew up in this movement that really believed in its power to change the world. But yes, it is funny how even today she remains more optimistic than me. 

What drives you forward?

The older I am the more I realise that I am very lucky. I do what I love. And there are actually not so may people who can say that. The fact that I managed to indentified what my passion was and then had the luck to make it my job, that moves me forward. Knowing that I am doing what makes me happy. And that is very rare.

[trendsnewsandnetwork-blog]

Review: In ‘The Other Side of Everything,’ a Belgrade Apartment Symbolizes Upheaval

Review: In ‘The Other Side of Everything,’ a Belgrade Apartment Symbolizes Upheaval

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They were just a couple of unmarked doors, and they were always locked. The soft sounds of voices and the clinking of crockery as meals were prepared drifted through to the section of the elegant Belgrade apartment where the director Mila Turajlic grew up. Only much later would she learn what lay behind those doors, and why. Yet their eventual opening would liberate more than just the…