Pretty Village, Pretty Flame

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Lepa sela lepo gore
Pretty Village, Pretty Flame

DVD cover
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. 800,000 people went to see the movie in movie theatres in Serbia, a country of 7.5 million people.[citation needed] A more accurate translation of the original Serbian title is Pretty Villages Burn Prettily.

Contents

[edit] Summary

The plot, inspired by real life events 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 (it is based on an article written by Vanja Bulić). Through flashbacks that describe the pre-war lives of each trapped soldier, the film describes life in 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 a Bosnian Muslim village.

However, the film also caused some controversy, mostly among Bosniaks 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 location in Republika Srpska (then not integrated into Bosnia and Herzegovina), often in places that were former battlefields.

[edit] Plot

The movie's main protagonist is Milan (Dragan Bjelogrlić), a Bosnian Serb. At the beginning of the war in Bosnia, his life in his little village with his best friend Halil (Nikola Pejaković), 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.

During the conflict, Milan joins the Bosnian Serb Army and is attached to a squad that includes:

  • Veljo (Nikola Kojo): 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" (Dragan Maksimović): 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) (Zoran Cvijanović): An unstable Belgrade junkie who tried to commit suicide by jumping off a highway overpass only to land in a Yugoslav People's Army (JNA) truck headed towards the Croatian border. At the frontlines he drives an ambulance truck and is the only one who is able to speak English.
  • Viljuška (Fork) (Milorad Mandić): 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 ate using their hands.
  • Laza (Dragan Petrović): 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' (pejorative term for the Bosnia's Muslims) or Kraut set foot here".
  • Marko (Marko Kovijanić): A young man who appears to be about 18 years old. He is often foolish and desperately seeking the approval of his squad-members.
  • Gvozden (Bata Živojinović): The squad's captain, and a professionally trained JNA officer. He is a loyalist to Yugoslavia and it's ideals. He has past history with the Muslim squad's leader as they both served for years in the JNA.
  • Liza (Lisa Moncure): Liza 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 three 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 ambushed and encircled by a group of Muslim fighters. Seeing that there is no way around the issue, Milan decides to tell his surviving 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; the truck explodes killing both Gvozden and the Muslim fighters, and opening the way out.

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. Halil is then 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 a 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.

Finally, there is a scene outside the main narrative of the film in which the young Milan and Halil find out the tunnel is full of dead bodies.

[edit] Quotes

Milan (Bjelogrlić) and Halil (Pejaković) in Lepa sela lepo gore
Milan (Bjelogrlić) and Halil (Pejaković) in Lepa sela lepo gore

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.

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...

[edit] Awards

"Lepa sela lepo gore" garnered six wins and one nomination:

[edit] Trivia

  • One of Indexi's most notable songs, "Bacila je sve niz rijeku", is played many times in the movie.

[edit] External links

Cinema of Serbia

Actors • Directors • Films A-Z • Cinematographers • Composers • Editors • Producers • Screenwriters •
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