Pretty Village, Pretty Flame
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| Lepa sela lepo gore Pretty Village, Pretty Flame |
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 DVD cover |
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| Directed by | Srđan Dragojević |
| Produced by | RTS, Dragan Bjelogrlić, Milko Josifov, Goran Bjelogrlić, Nikola Kojo |
| Written by | Vanja Bulić, Srđan Dragojević, Biljana Maksić, Nikola Pejaković |
| Starring | Dragan Bjelogrlić, Nikola Kojo, Milorad Mandić, Dragan Maksimović, Zoran Cvijanović, Lisa Moncure |
| Music by | Aleksandar Habić, Lazar Ristovski |
| Cinematography | Dušan Joksimović |
| Editing by | Petar Marković |
| Release date(s) | 1996 |
| Running time | 115 min |
| Language | Serbian/English |
| IMDb profile | |
Pretty Village, Pretty Flame (Serbian: Лепа села лепо горе or Lepa sela lepo gore) is a controversial 1996 Serbian film directed by Srđan Dragojević that gave uniquely bleak yet ironic portrayal of the Bosnian War. It is considered a modern classic of Serbian cinema. A more accurate translation of the original Serbian title is Pretty Villages Burn Beautifully.
The plot, inspired by real life event that took place in the opening stages of the Bosnian War, tells a story about small group of Bosnian Serb soldiers trapped in a tunnel by a Bosnian Muslim force. The film's plot is based on an article written by Vanja Bulić about the real life events.
Through flashbacks that describe the pre-war lives of each trapped soldier, the film describes life in the former Yugoslavia and tries to give an answer as to why former neighbours and friends turned on each other.
The film won accolades for superb direction, excellent acting and brutally realistic portrayal of the war in former Yugoslavia. It was also the first Serbian film to show the Serbian side of the conflict involved in atrocities and ethnic cleansing - the title of the film is an ironic comment on the protagonists' activities in an abandoned Bosnian Muslim village.
However, the film also caused some controversy, mostly among Bosnian Muslims and Croats, many of whom complained about its alleged pro-Serb bias and unequal treatment of warring sides, citing different depictions of atrocities. According to this view, Bosnian Serb atrocities are shown with ironic flair, while Bosnian Muslim atrocities are shown with utter solemnity.
It should also be noted that Srđan Dragojević shot some scenes on the location in the Republika Srpska (then not integrated into Bosnia and Herzegovina), often in places that were former battlefields.
800,000 people went to see the movie in movie theatres in Serbia, a country of 7.5 million people. [citation needed]
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[edit] Plot
The movie's main protagonist is Milan, a Bosnian Serb. At the beginning of the war in Bosnia his life in his little village with his best friend Halil (a Muslim) is generally quiet and reminiscent of that of a normal lifestyle in the countryside. He gradually notices that Bosnian Muslims whom he knew in his village are slowly but surely moving out.
Milan joins the Bosnian Serb Army during the conflict and is attached to a squad that includes:
- Veljo: A career criminal and thief from Belgrade who did most of his "work" in Germany in the late 1980s and early 1990s. On a visit home, he pretended to be his younger brother, knowing full well he'd be taken to the frontlines, when authorities came to his pick up his draft-dodging sibling. He provides the film's title. After the squad set a village alight, they watch it burn and he says: "Pretty villages are pretty when they burn. Ugly villages are ugly, even when they burn." (in Serbian, Lepa sela lepo gore, a ružna sela su ružna, čak i kad gore.)
- Petar "Professor": A Bosnian Serb school teacher from Banja Luka before the war, he seems to have nostalgic feelings towards Yugoslavia. While some of the others loot houses, he is more interested in literature. He intermittently reads from a burnt diary he found in one of the villages the squad passed through.
- Brzi (Speedy): An unstable Belgrade junkie who tried to commit suicide by jumping off a highway overpass only to land in a JNA army truck headed towards the Croatian border. At the frontlines he drives an ambulance truck and is the only one who can communicate with Lisa effectively, as he is able to speak English.
- Viljuška (Fork): An outright Chetnik from a rural area in central Serbia who is interested in keeping his brother-in-law's (Laza) head on his shoulders. He is nicknamed Fork because he carries a fork around his neck symbolising Serbian sophistication in the 14th century and compares Serbian kings to English and German kings at the time, who supposedly ate using their hands.
- Laza: Laza is Viljuška's cousin who was so outraged by a news-report in Serbia about atrocities perpetrated against Serbs that he walked to the nearest highway and hitchhiked to the nearest recruitment centre. Unaware that he had been picked up by a Turkish truck driver who lived in Germany (a gastarbeiter), he explained that "never again shall a "Turk" (Bosnian Muslims) or Kraut set foot here".
- Marko: A young man, he is often foolish and desperately seeking the approval of his squad-members, he appears to be about 18 years old.
- Gvozden: The squad's captain, and a professionally trained JNA officer. He is a loyalist to Yugoslavia and it's ideals, and admires Marshal Tito. He has past history with the Muslim squad's leader as they both served for years in the JNA.
- Lisa: Lisa is a reporter for an American news network, and snuk into Speedy's medical truck before he drove it into the tunnel.
Milan is generally dissatisfied with the way the war is being conducted and is disturbed by the fact that profiteers are looting and burning his best friend Halil's property. Milan shoots 3 of the profiteers, wounding them and is shocked that the nearby kafana owner (at whose kafana he used to drink with Halil) is with them. Milan later finds out from the kafana owner that his mother has been killed by Muslims belonging to Halil's squad.
As the movie progresses, Milan and his squad are encircled by a group of Muslim fighters. Seeing that there is no way around the issue, Milan decides to tell his squad mates about a tunnel he was scared of entering as a child. The squad enters the tunnel and engages in a firefight with the Muslim fighters as they desperately trying to seek cover. They are joined by Brzi and Liza.
The squad stays inside the cave for a week and slowly but surely the soldiers snap, one by one they try to leave the tunnel and they are killed or wounded for it, meanwhile each of them have flashbacks as to what brought each of them into this situation.
After their force has been whittled down substantially, Gvozden drives the truck out of the tunnel shooting Muslim soldiers on his way out. The truck explodes killing both Gvozden and the Muslim fighters.
The movie's climax is when Milan and Halil meet outside at the tunnel's exit and openly ask each other a few important questions. Halil asks who burned down his shop while Milan asks who killed his mother, both men deny each of the actions and Halil is killed by a Serbian artillery strike.
Milan, Petar and Brzi escape and all three are sent to the Belgrade Military Hospital, where Brzi dies.
[edit] Structure
Although the film has highly non-linear structure, most consider it easy to follow. The story is told in several time periods, which cut back and forth:
- 1980 - Milan and Halil are young boys, and this thread shows their childhood friendship. It is set somewhere in Bosnia, we assume somewhere in the Drina valley.
- Late 1980s/early 1990s - Milan and Halil set up an auto-repair business.
- 1992 - Referenced in the film as "the first day of the war", this probably takes place on March 2, as the kafana owner reads about the shooting of Nikola Gardović in Sarajevo (which occurred on March 1 and is considered by Serbs to mark the start of the war) in the Večernje novosti newspaper.
- 1994 - The main thrust of the film, in which the squad is pinned down in the tunnel.
- 1994 (the "present") - Milan and the Professor, as well as an unconscious Speedy, are in a military hospital in Belgrade.
In addition, there is an prologue and epilogue:
- 1971 - The prologue is purportedly a newsreel, showing the opening of the Tunnel of Brotherhood and Unity on 27 June 1971
- Epilogue - Some unspecified time after the war. This is also supposedly a newsreel, showing the re-opening of the reconstructed tunnel under the new name of the Tunnel of Peace.
[edit] Quotes
[edit] Newspapers
Halil: Fuck Večernje novosti! Why don’t you read Oslobođenje?
Slobodan: It's too big for me, like bed sheets.
Halil: Well then, spread it out on the floor, squat down, and read.
Slobodan: Yeah, it does make a good prayer mat.
[edit] Fata's monkey
Speedy: Hey, balije, do you know the one about Fata walking a monkey through Sarajevo?
Muslim: Go on, čedo, speak!
Speedy: People asked her, "where did you get that thing from?" "From UNPROFOR", she said. "Well, bona, why didn't you have an abortion?!"
[Muslims and Serbs laugh]
Speedy: Thank you, thank you!
[Speedy is wounded in a Muslim attack, and a few of the attackers have been killed]
Speedy: (to Serbs) What the fuck is your problem? You killed my audience...
