Sofia International Film Festival

• View
• Edit

Goran PaskalevicPerhaps the most original Serbian director today is in Sofia for the meeting of the Bord of the European Film Academy. As a member of EFA Goran Paskaljevic took part in Sofia Meetings and he also found a time in his hectic schedule to talk with me about his last five films from Balkan Cabaret (1998) onwards. SIFF’s audiences are familiar with all of them.

When I end working on a certain film I immediately start working on a new one. Balkan Cabaret (1998) is a film about violence which surrounds us, but not the violence that we see in the American films, full of blood; it is about the hidden violence in a family, between friends, on the street – this is the violence that corrupts and our society. When I made How Harry Became a Tree (2001), the protagonist resembles Milosevic even though the action takes place in Ireland. This is the story of a man who likes to create enemies because the more enemies he has the more important he thinks he is…

After the assault against Zoran Djindjic, who was a good friend of mine and the first democratically elected Serbian prime minister, I felt that my country is in a strange state of autism. While studying the social autism I came up with the idea of А Midwinter Night’s Dream (2004).

Later on our politicians started proclaiming a fake optimism and that’s why I decided to make my film Optimists (2006).

You can read the whole interview on our festival's site www.siff.bg

13 March 2011