Growing right-wing views among young people, a lack of community and social responsibility, an immoral elite, and Serbia’s virtual no-go subject of homosexuality are all handled with an unpatronising honesty and with feeling and a familiarity that helps the story translate beyond the subtitles. Serbia’s right-wing views and immoral elite To varying effect.īy interlacing the universal stories and hang ups of a class of typical teenage characters, Stevan creates a familiarity that is at once both comforting and disturbing, as well as being accessible to audiences at home as well as abroad.īy painting most of the characters in this ensemble story as fairly formulaic cut-outs, Stevan is able to set out themes and issues around realistic dialogue and exchanges. Before long emotions run high, secrets are shared and true feelings are revealed. But before long, they split into groups and talk in ways that would have seemed out of the question during a normal school day.Īs their attitudes, opinions and anxieties surface, the students are forced to face up to themselves and each other. Serb teens in drink, drugs and sex rampageĪt first, the over-exuberant youths let off steam in a drink-drunk-sex fuelled rampage through the school.
Seeing red, she confiscates their mobile phones, bolts the doors and leaves the teenagers alone in the rundown school overnight. The following morning Olja catches some boys watching the attack on YouTube but her class refuses to reveal the offenders. When controversial exhibition by her artist husband Uglješa ( Dragan Mićanović: Coriolanus, RocknRolla, Layer Cake) provokes Serbian nationalists, a gang of masked youths think that the teacher needs to be taught a lesson The device that triggers it all is a nighttime attack by a group of teenagers on idealistic Belgrade teacher Olja ( Hristina Popović: Circles and The Parade), who is ridiculed for her left-leaning views. The story is a simple one: a group of teenagers with only their school room in common are forced to face up to their personal struggles and traumas, with enlightening and life-changing results for some of them. Politics and drama at a Belgrade high school Sensing that they were on to something special international film critics, including Hollywood Reporter, soon added their acclaim.
Next to Me, the latest cinema release from one of Serbia’s leading young writer-directors Stevan Filipovićwas a champion right out of the blocks.Īfter being named Best Film on its world premiere at last month’s Pula International Film Festival, it showed that this honour was not a fluke by winning the Young Audience Award at the Sarajevo Film Festival. When a Serbian film makes waves beyond the domestic market, critics and audiences sit up and pay attention.Īs thought-provoking and socially relevant high school drama Pored Mene ( Next to Me ) clocks up international awards and acclaim, the signs are strong for this will translate into bums on seats. September, 2015 by Marcus Agar News, Opinion 3 comments
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