Mali vojnici

It is so amazing! When my ex wife and my two kids and me decided to go to live in Dubrovnik, we were warned by the director of this film Bato Čengić who I knew personally not to go to live there, because Dubrovnik is a small and a backwater place, destroyed by war. He said that a destiny of a kid portrayed in this film could come and hunt my sons.

I am sorry to say that my son Theodore lived a mobbing not very different from the mobbing of the Nazi kid portrayed in this film.

After my ex wife saw this film she came to ask me, since we were already divorced, to sign the papers so she and the kids could go and live back to the USA. I happily signed those papers, and my son Theodore is far away from the horrors which Dubrovnik can offer.

This film was not made in Bosnia or Serbia, but in Dubrovnik, more precisely in the summer residence of the Dubrovnik aristocracy in what today is marina for the yachts in Ombla river area. (By the way it is the shortest river in the world, it immediately runs into Adriatic Sea as soon as it springs out).

What a film! Apart that I am personally connected to the events portrayed in this film, you should see it, because it is a remarkable film!

First of all, this can hardly be called a war movie. It takes place right after the Second world war, in an asylum for war orphans, somewhere in Bosnia or Serbia.

Main characters are orphans. There are only four adults in the movie, and only two of them appear for more than a few minutes. This is only one of the reasons for my comparing it to "Lord of the flies". Isolated background and raw cruelty are other. As "Lord", this is a story ABOUT children, but not FOR children. But the reasons for cruelty and hate here are obvious. We feel compassion for the torturers as well as for the victim. And the end leaves us wondering... but I do not want to say too much.

There are certain remarkable scenes in the movie (for example: a kid on a horse moving backwards through grain fields); some could even be called surrealistic. All in all, I would say that the movie was ahead of its time, especially in Yugoslav cinematography. Let me also mention that the movie was due to compete in Cannes, but that year's festival was canceled.

I certainly recommend this movie to anyone who can find it. I doubt that it is out on DVD, so if you want to see it I guess you can only hope to catch it on some of ex-Yugoslav TV stations, as I did.