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Lepa sela lepo gore (1996)
A MASTERPIECE!
Being of Serbian heritage, and being born in the U.S.A, I can say that I've seen many films on both sides. America has the Vietnam film, and so a film like THE DEER HUNTER can be said tha it is the best Vietnam film of all time. So, it can be said that Pretty Village... is the best film about the Bosnian war! My family took in a Serbian Soldier that was wonded during that war, lost a leg and eye in battle, and the stories he told are eerily silimar to this film.
I am also a film maker, and I can say that over the many years of seeing brilliant films, this one is one of the best. The film cuts back and forth like a pendulam.... showing us just enough of each character's past to understand why they joined the army... and why they are now starving in a tunnel. The film is heavy on symbolisim... the tunnel represents all that was lost with the break up of Yugoslavia. It represents what ONCE WAS... and now is the setting of a tragic battle.
The film begins with a story about a wedding party that was killed... and yes, its true, a Serbian wedding party was killed before the war broke out... this lead to the bloody conflict. The film captures all the right aspects of the war. It can be said that this film is up there with Emir Kusterica's UNDERGROUND as one of the best films from the former Yugoslavia. Also, not a strange coincedence at the end of the film. This film was shot before the Kosovo conflict... a couple of years before.... but in the end, a image of the tunnel is shown being RE-OPEN! A narrator says that the Tunnel was being re-opened for the international community.... then a man cuts his thumb on the ribbon.... just as he did at the start. The meaning behind this is suppose to indicate that another conflict would errupt in that region! The narrator said the year was 1999. Funny how the film predicted that something would happen that year... which it did: KOSOVO! That is very bizarre!
If you want to see a gripping, and tragic, and painful film... see Pretty Village, Pretty Flame! It is unlike anything you've ever seen!