Ubistvo s predumisljajem (1995)

User Rating:

8.2/10   

Director:

Gorcin Stojanovic

Writers:

Slobodan Selenic (novel)
Slobodan Selenic (screenplay)

Release Date:

15 November 1995 (Yugoslavia)

Plot:

Men, women, and war. Jelena Panic is a young woman in Belgrade in the early 1990s, during Serbia's war...

Plot Keywords:

Based On Novel

Awards:

2 wins

Cast

Branka Katic	...	Jelena Panic (Bulika)
Nebojsa Glogovac	...	Bogdan Bilogorac
Ana Sofrenovic	...	Jelena Ljubisavljevic
Dragan Micanovic	...	Jovan
Sergej Trifunovic	...	Krsman Jaksic
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Nada Blam	...	Medicinska sestra
Svetozar Cvetkovic	...	Debeli
Vladan Dujovic	...	Mladi Branko
Predrag Ejdus	...	Dr. Cvetkovic
Rade Markovic	...	Dr. Branko Kojovic
Dejan Matic	...	Vodja studentskog pokreta
Radoslav Milenkovic	...	Muzdeka
Gordana Pavlov
Ljubisa Samardzic	...	Vidosav
Danilo 'Bata' Stojkovic	...	Stavra Arandjelovic
Aljosa Vuckovic	...	Russian Colonel

Also Known As:

Premeditated Murder (USA)

Runtime:

94 min

Country:

Federal Republic of Yugoslavia

Language:

Serbo-Croatian

Color:

Color

Sound Mix:

Dolby SR

Filming Locations:

Belgrade, Serbia

Company:

Cinema Design, Belgrade

Trivia:

In 1996, members of the Yugoslavian Board of the Academy of Film Art and Science (AFUN) voted this film the 7th best Serbian movie in 1947-1995 period

Good

Another offering from Ljubisa Samardzic's post-acting career workshop. This time he was at it as a producer, before his rather mediocre directorial attempts in "Nebeska udica" and "Natasa".

Here, he and director Gorcin Stojanovic took a novel by the late great Slobodan Selenic and made a decent movie out of it.

Two separate stories run concurrently through the film. First, in the 1990s Belgrade with young Jelena (Branka Katic) meeting a soldier Bogdan, a Serb form Croatia (Nebojsa Glogovac) who's in town recovering after being wounded at the frontlines in Croatia. And the other in late 1940s Belgrade, told through Jelena's grandmother's journal that she found years later. In it, her grandma of the same name (played by: Ana Sofrenovic) is trying to free her Chetnik sympathizer stepfather from jail while herself adjusting to new post-WW2 realities and being wooed by two men - stepfather's snobby son Jovan (Dragan Micanovic) and a powerful Partizan commander Krsman (Sergej Trifunovic).

After a poor start movie starts delivering and gets better with each passing scene. There were many insightful moments but also some melodramatic fluff which would've been better suited for a sappy TV drama.

In the end, one gets a feeling "Ubistvo s predumisljajem" turned out OK despite the director rather than because of him. This movie's quality is in the great Slobodan Selenic story, which proved too good to be messed up by anyone and is alone worth the price of admission.