Life Is a Miracle

Life is really a miracle, or rather some miracles. And one of them is to realize that at least one director, despite of the lack of ideas, capabilities, culture and courage nowadays creeping through the modern cinema background, can still shoot such wonderful masterpieces. Kusturica perfectly draws scenes and characters, plays with music and animals, skilfully weaves the plot and cover the whole lenght of the movie with something magic that only a Jugoslavian can create. This is film obviously shows also a dramatic and harsh reality, but always relieved by a light-hearted approach to life.

I do not really understand how can someone assert that this movie is a copy or a repetition of previous Kusturica's ones. Should have any sense, for example, a critic to the great Kurosawa because some of his genial masterpieces are similar one another or since they deal always with samurai's stories?

It's a best movie I have seen during the last few years. After the film I had feeling that Hollywood is just a factory producing cheep colored jewelry. The film is a drama with happy end. In this movie you can find real feelings, real values. There is described the philosophy of war, how stupid and silly it can be. Kusturica's humor is sharp and true. The most funny for me in this film was a place with international "peacekeeping" organizations , there "role" in solving of conflicts, "saving" people. In fact the author shows how useless and inadequate are those organizations in such cases. Kusturica is a great as usual and the soundtrack like in all his films too.

But a good one anyway. Director Kusturica has already accustomed us with his caricatural way of telling stories occurring in several parts of former Yugoslavia presenting their characters as burlesque. He doesn't ridicule them, however. In fact he shows love and even some tenderness for them. He simply doesn't take life seriously and plays in a first class way with war, ethnic conflict, love and so on. But sentiment and emotion are not altogether absent of this movie. Behind the humorous scenes we can feel the depth of love that arises between the Serbian railway engineer and his supposed prisoner Muslim girl that he intends to exchange for his son who was captured by the Bosnian army during the Bosnian war of 1992. Some of the love scenes are full of humour but also of poetry and even fantasy like when their bed flies over the fields of Bosnia in some kind of dream. The first part of the movie is a quick succession of funny incidents and accidents. When the love story begins in the second part its pace is a bit more calm without losing completely its rapid rhythm. It's a movie that puts you on a happy frame of mind and don't forget the important role of the she-donkey which will make you laugh at several scenes. In the end the animal performs even an important part in the issue of the story that without its intervention would probably have a sad outcome.

A typical energetic work from Emir Kusturica who allures us into his bizarre world inhabited with eccentric and weird human beings. Characters as they are exposed to us seem quite unnatural but as the movie gradually absorbs one gets used to and cares about them. Kusturica harmoniously blends comedy with drama and the result is an enjoyable and entertaining movie despite being built on a dramatic theme. The landscapes in the movie are breathtaking and an offbeat music has always been an integral part in Kusturica's works. Some elements might seem repetitive from his previous movies but I would rather infer those elements as a stamp of a genius. The only thing that almost spoils a delightful experience is an actress portraying Luca's wife. I could not swallow her annoying grimaces no matter how hard I tried. Her scenes apart, the movie is a pleasure to watch.

I think this movie won't surprise anyone who has already seen another movie by this great film-maker: it is the same place (Blakans) and style as we are used to. If you liked his other movies, you will surely like this one too.

The story develops around a small bosnian village, where the lives of his inhabitants are changed by the war that shattered Bosnia 12 years ago. So far nothing extraordinary, but what makes his movies different are the atmosphere and life that springs out of every image.

There are two levels at which you can perceive this movie: the first is the rational level: the story, the gags (as in all his movies, humor has a central part) and so on. The second might be called irrational, because it has to do with identification and feelings: you are taken out of your seat and are part of what happens on the screen. Drama is placed very closely to comedy, and sometimes the change is so sudden your laughs freeze on your face. This I guess is the landmark of this movie: dramatic scenes build upon, and increase their strength from, funny scenes. After all, nothing can be taken seriously in the Balkans :-)

I won't say too much about the story, partly because I don't want to spoil your fun, partly because I feel it's unimportant. Suffice to say that the war is presented only by its "reflection" in peoples lives -- this is what matters most in Kusturica's view. There are no battle scenes.

I think the only thing I can reproach is that once or twice I felt the gags were exaggerated, a bit unnatural. But all Kusturica's movies have a dose of fantastic, so this is not a real problem.

I cannot end without pointing out the great performance of the lead actor, Slavko Stimac (Luka). All in all, I would strongly recommend this movie.