The story follows an underground weapons manufacturer in Belgrade during WWII and evolves into fairly surreal situations. A black marketeer who smuggles the weapons to partisans doesn't ... See full summary »
Keep track of everything you watch; tell your friends.
If your account is linked with Facebook and you have turned on sharing, this will show up in your activity feed. If not, you can turn on sharing
here
.
Greek Sea, World War II. An Italian ship leaves a handful of soldiers in a little island; their mission is to spot enemy ships and to hold the island in case of attack. The village of the ... See full summary »
Director:
Gabriele Salvatores
Stars:
Diego Abatantuono,
Claudio Bigagli,
Giuseppe Cederna
Bosnia and Herzegovina during 1993 at the time of the heaviest fighting between the two warring sides. Two soldiers from opposing sides in the conflict, Nino and Ciki, become trapped in no man's land, whilst a third soldier becomes a living booby trap.
Director:
Danis Tanovic
Stars:
Branko Djuric,
Rene Bitorajac,
Filip Sovagovic
September of 1944, a few days before Finland went out of the Second World War. A chained to a rock Finnish sniper-kamikadze Veikko managed to set himself free. Ivan, a captain of the Soviet... See full summary »
Director:
Aleksandr Rogozhkin
Stars:
Anni-Kristiina Juuso,
Ville Haapasalo,
Viktor Bychkov
During the Japanese occupation of China, two prisoners are dumped in a peasant's home in a small town. The owner is bullied into keeping the prisoners until the next New Year, at which time... See full summary »
A young trapeze artist must decide between her lust for Sergio, the Happy Clown, or her affection for Javier, the Sad Clown, both of whom are deeply disturbed.
Director:
Álex de la Iglesia
Stars:
Carlos Areces,
Antonio de la Torre,
Carolina Bang
The story follows an underground weapons manufacturer in Belgrade during WWII and evolves into fairly surreal situations. A black marketeer who smuggles the weapons to partisans doesn't mention to the workers that the war is over, and they keep producing. Years later, they break out of their underground "shelter" --- only to convince themselves that the war is still going on. Written by
Anonymous
Many years ago I hitchhiked through Yugoslavia and found a diverse, down to earth people living in harmony. Many years later, after economic decline and the breakup of the Soviet Union, Slovenia and Croatia declared their independence and signaled the end of the country of Yugoslavia. Emir Kusturica's Underground is a bold recreation of the events that led to the breakup, spanning the years of the Nazi invasion of World War II to the present wars. The film has been called Serbian propaganda, self-indulgent, an anti-Communist tract, an anti-war tome, cynical, nihilistic, and it may be any or all of those, but primarily it is a work of art whose surreal vision and poetic language makes any search for a coherent message elusive.
Underground traces the lives of Marco (Miki Manojlovic) and Blacky (Lazar Ristovski), two charming but immoral black market profiteers who fight the Nazis while hiding in a massive cellar with friends and family where they produce and sell munitions. Marko and Blacky both compete for the attention of actress Natalija (Mirjana Jokovic) after Blacky's wife Vera (Mirjana Karanovic) dies in childbirth, but Natalija plays both of them off against the German soldier Franz ((Ernst Stotzner). After the war, perhaps as a metaphor for the constricting rule of President Tito, Marko fails to inform the underground community that the war has ended, keeping everyone in the dark so that he can support the Communist regime and make a profit selling arms to middlemen.
Natalija helps Marco keep up the charade when he makes Blacky into a venerated national hero even though he is still alive. The only innocent characters in the film are Marco's slow-witted brother Ivan (Slavko Stimac) and his pet monkey Sino who form a lifelong bond after German bombs destroy the zoo where he was working. It is only when Sino crawls into the barrel of a tank and fires its guns do the inhabitants of the cellar work their way toward freedom and, in the process of discovery, react like space travelers finding a new world. The new world, however, looks very much like the old and when brother turns against brother, the disintegration of Yugoslavia is complete.
Underground is an exuberantly entertaining three-hour carnival filled with wild characters, singing, drinking, and fighting and a brass band that keeps the energy high with Gypsy melodies. While it is a broad comedy that often descends into borderline lunacy, it is also a tragic vision of the betrayal of a people. Its final Felliniesque image of all the characters reunited on a piece of land drifting into the sea tells more than the obvious metaphor of a broken land and a broken people. It is a testament to the endurance, the acceptance of life, and the commitment to joy of the Yugoslav people and a passionate cry for their regeneration.
92 of 101 people found this review helpful.
Was this review helpful to you?
Many years ago I hitchhiked through Yugoslavia and found a diverse, down to earth people living in harmony. Many years later, after economic decline and the breakup of the Soviet Union, Slovenia and Croatia declared their independence and signaled the end of the country of Yugoslavia. Emir Kusturica's Underground is a bold recreation of the events that led to the breakup, spanning the years of the Nazi invasion of World War II to the present wars. The film has been called Serbian propaganda, self-indulgent, an anti-Communist tract, an anti-war tome, cynical, nihilistic, and it may be any or all of those, but primarily it is a work of art whose surreal vision and poetic language makes any search for a coherent message elusive.
Underground traces the lives of Marco (Miki Manojlovic) and Blacky (Lazar Ristovski), two charming but immoral black market profiteers who fight the Nazis while hiding in a massive cellar with friends and family where they produce and sell munitions. Marko and Blacky both compete for the attention of actress Natalija (Mirjana Jokovic) after Blacky's wife Vera (Mirjana Karanovic) dies in childbirth, but Natalija plays both of them off against the German soldier Franz ((Ernst Stotzner). After the war, perhaps as a metaphor for the constricting rule of President Tito, Marko fails to inform the underground community that the war has ended, keeping everyone in the dark so that he can support the Communist regime and make a profit selling arms to middlemen.
Natalija helps Marco keep up the charade when he makes Blacky into a venerated national hero even though he is still alive. The only innocent characters in the film are Marco's slow-witted brother Ivan (Slavko Stimac) and his pet monkey Sino who form a lifelong bond after German bombs destroy the zoo where he was working. It is only when Sino crawls into the barrel of a tank and fires its guns do the inhabitants of the cellar work their way toward freedom and, in the process of discovery, react like space travelers finding a new world. The new world, however, looks very much like the old and when brother turns against brother, the disintegration of Yugoslavia is complete.
Underground is an exuberantly entertaining three-hour carnival filled with wild characters, singing, drinking, and fighting and a brass band that keeps the energy high with Gypsy melodies. While it is a broad comedy that often descends into borderline lunacy, it is also a tragic vision of the betrayal of a people. Its final Felliniesque image of all the characters reunited on a piece of land drifting into the sea tells more than the obvious metaphor of a broken land and a broken people. It is a testament to the endurance, the acceptance of life, and the commitment to joy of the Yugoslav people and a passionate cry for their regeneration.