Razredni sovraznik

I have to admit that some of the characters annoyed me but later you can see how the director needed them to go in that direction to bring out the final point. This is an art film in the best tradition, enough information disclosed to follow the plot and enough information not given to allow the viewer to project him/herself into the plot.

I left the movie theater with a mixture of contradictory feelings and feeling that many of us actually end up in other matters that are important to us behaving like the best friend while everybody around has an opinion and a motive.

The high school in the movie offers a miniature version not only of Slovenian society but of many other societies where our unwillingness to come to terms with our prejudices, our inability to connect with others and our past end up paralyzing us while we think we are moving somewhere.

"Learning means not knowing, wanting means not being able to"

Class Enemy was a Revelation at Miskolc CINEFEST, 2014: If one of the basic purposes of a film festival is to discover and reveal new talent from small countries then Jameson Miskolc in rural Hungary is doing a truly remarkable job. Apart from four discoveries mentioned yesterday even more powerful new films have surfaced since -- from smaller countries that one does not generally think of as sources of quality cinema. On day number four (September 15) I was astounded by the quality of a film from Slovenia -- yes, Slovenia -- a teeny country sandwiched in between Austria, Italy and Croatia. The film in question is called "RAZREDNI SOVRADNIK" which translates as "Class Enemy", a kind of update to the XXI. Century of the Hollywood Classic "The Blackboard Jungle" (1955), but far more profound and powerful in dealing with the wider repercussions of a high school rebellion.

A very strict and erudite substitute teacher of German replaces a popular female German teacher on maternity leave. The obstreperous students quickly label him a Fascist and hold him personally responsible when a girl in the class commits suicide after playing Chopin Opus 38 for him behind closed doors. The ethereal Chopin piano passages become a leit motif throughout the film referencing shy Sabina, the girl who committed suicide -- an act only referred to but not actually seen on screen.

The entire school now rebels against established authority until an eventual compromise between faculty and student body is reached, but not before the whole town has gotten involved and all kinds of personal side issues have cropped up. Slovenian actor Igor Samobor (56) is in total command of the role of the unsavory controversial Thomas Mann spouting teacher -- the Class Enemy of the title, and very attractive actress Natasa Barbara Gracner(45) is most ingratiating as the cool headed school principal in change of handling the widening social crisis. All student roles are excellent in a perfectly balanced ensemble cast where each personality is clearly defined. This is an unusually mature debut by a 28 year old director, Roc Bicek, unquestionably a talent to keep eye on. Voted best film of the festival, young Bicek was on hand to pick up his well deserved award at the closing ceremony/

Photo: Rebellious students come to class all wearing masks of the face of a classmate who committed suicide in Roc Bicek's "Class Enemy"

It's story about class mates' revenge against a teacher who supposedly bullies one of the students to the point of suicide. The film is poorly written and badly directed. It starts with a rather long shot of a student who is irrelevant in the film. OTS shots in dialogue have no matching counter shots even if the other character is talking! Teacher is always shot from the same position, and he never actually does anything but recite the same German author over and over again - a very poorly constructed villain. The actor who plays him has no charisma, he's boring and not convincing at all. There is no main character or protagonist. Even though we see the bullying we never actually get lead into the possibility of suicide. The student never shows any sign of mental instability that could make her do that. Crying, which is the only thing she does, is not enough reason to commit suicide. Also, we never actually see the suicide, we just learn about it. The writer obviously had not done his research nor had he studied basic rules of screen writing. Don't watch it, you will never get those 1.5 hours back.

Definitely worth of watching (not only once), the script is great written and main character nailed his role, just with face expressions he gives you quick opinion that he is evil teacher/psycho who hates students. Through the movie we get to know his main goal is to prepare students for hard life and reality that is in front of them. But even tho there still remains some mysteries in the plot especially about him so you can't make any final conclusions. What makes movie so outstanding compared to others Slovenian movies is how you need to create your own picture about certain scenes and opinions about the characters. Also vibe is very dark and tense for most part of the movie with plot twists on point in the way you are 100% not expecting them, different from anything else on our movie scene. Only thing that could be better is acting of some students and better use of different colors through the movie.

Recently I went to the 'Film by the Sea International Film Festival' where I got to see 'Razredni sovraznik' and the French 'Des morceaux de moi'.

Razredni sovraznik is about a Slovenian class which gets a new German teacher, a student commits suicide shortly after having a private conversation with the teacher. The students blame the new teacher and rebel against not only their German teacher but the whole schooling system.

I found the movie idea good because it's something that could actually happen. It seemed like something that was quite interesting to watch since it showed a natural human way of thinking.

The director made good use of the camera angles making up for the fact that there are little to no special effects. The movie also had great lightning adding to the atmosphere. The director decided to go for quite some silences which build up tension that he did not make use of, these silences were quite overused in the movie. The actors did a brilliant job but sadly enough the dialogue was not as strong as it should have been which might have also been the reason why I did not enjoy the ending.

The movie had great potential but eventually it was long-winded with a weak ending to something that could have been so much more. The lightning together with the beautiful camera shots and the great acting was the main reason why I still gave it a 6 out of 10. I didn't enjoy the movie but I would recommend this to people who can watch a real psychological movie with 'nothing' happening.