Annick Favorite: No Man's Land 
Film Danis Tanovic - 2000 - Belgium-Bosnia
Cast: Branko Djuric (Tchiki), Rene Bitorajac (Nino), Georges Siatidis (Sergeant Marchand), Katrin Cartlidge (Jane Livingstone), Filip Sovagovic (Cera), Serge-Henri Valcke (Captain Dubois), Sacha Kremer ( Michel), Alain Eloy (Pierre), Bogdan Diklic (Serbian Officer), Simon Callow (Colonel Soft), Tanja Ribic (Martha), Branko Zavrsan (Minesweeper)
Cinematographer: Walther van den Ende
Editor: Francesca Calvelli
Designer: Dusko Milavec
Costume: Zvonka Makuc
Producers: Marc Baschet, Frederique Dumas, Marion Hänsel, Cedomir Kolar
Production: Great Britain: Counihan Villiers Productions, Italy: Fabrica, Belgium: Man's Films, France: Noah Productions
Presentation Anji Milanovic in The black feather sort of prism of anger and the travesty of war
No Man's Land looks without compromising on the trenches. Director Bosnian director Danis Tanovic, who himself served in the army, tells the story of three men, two Muslims and a Serb, trapped in a ditch and face the absurdity of their destiny.
Following a skirmish, two survivors, Bosnian Chiki (Branko Djuric -
Time of the Gypsies) and Serb Nino (Rene Bitorajac) occur in the same trench. Believing a Bosnian soldier dead, the stooge of Nino's body hidden under a mine exploded during his sensible pick.
Enraged by the death of his friend and the ultimate indignity, Chiki kills only to discover that her boyfriend is still alive. The film then describes the various efforts undertaken to save him. Marchand (Georges Siatidis), a French soldier tired of doing nothing, trying to help him, but a colonel (Simon Callow) HQ in Zagreb, more interested in his secretary, will leave to join the long list of victims of savagery in Eastern Europe. Marchand, knowing that the dice are loaded, calls to the media and, like in Three Kings
, forcing the UN to intervene or face the embarrassment.
Tanovic has compared this film to
Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett, the only difference being that Godot is finally here, in uniform of United Nations peacekeepers that are totally unnecessary. Rather that analyzing the war, Tanovic denounces an international community that has sidelined by observing rather than help.
While the media circus starts, the UN plans its inactivity, while Chiki and Nino are aware when they are not trying to kill each other. In a rare interlude of peace, they discover they both rubbed the same girl. When Nino announces that she is gone abroad, Chiki suggests it is much better there. One has the impression that these two men could take a coffee they were not at war. The small details make the strength of this film. What kind of war, a soldier door there some tennis shoes with holes and a t-shirt of the Rolling Stones while another mine cart around in her bag?
Bosnian Humor is strong and black like coffee, and this film does not lack of caffeine. Trade between Chiki and Nino are often hilarious and their discussions about who started the war are missing the point but extremely important. When a soldier deplores the killings in Rwanda, the intensity does not go unnoticed. When finally arriving peacekeepers, they are greeted by the comment "That the smurfs! "(Their uniforms are blue and they are useless). In another scene, a child turns a UN soldier in ass playing the accordion until he gives him a pack of cigarettes.
chaos of so many nations unable to work together is also funny. The English do not trust the French, the Bosnians did not speak English, and Germans are always on time. Tanovic mocks the absurdity of this war as in the choice of actors: Croats interpret Serbs, Bosnians incarnate of Montenegrins, a Slovenian is a German minesweeper, etc..
Regardless of their character, their game is always convincing. Branko Djuric, a sort of cross between Al Pacino and Serge Gainsbourg, is the soul of the film. The always excellent Katrin Cartlidge (Breaking the Waves
,
Before the Rain) is a British journalist with the tenacity needed while Rene Bitorajac embodies a naive soldier but angry.
Unlike the usual glorious productions of the genre,
No Man's Land denounces the absurdity and futility of war and leaves us with the startling image of a man trapped by a mine. Many important films dealing with the subject come from this region in particular
Pretty Village Pretty Flame ,
Underground, Cabaret Balkan
,
Savior,
Broken Français and
Welcome to Sarajevo. If No Man's Land is specific to this region, it is nonetheless universal in its theme.
During the film festival at the AFI in Hollywood, as an American first generation, it was interesting to see that the room was dominated Yugoslav emigrants of all stripes, all laughing at the same dialogues that the subtitles could not do justice. Considering the film's end, this was all the more surreal and absurd.
