Slobodan Sijan Movies
- 1984
In this tongue-in-cheek horror film by Slobodan Sijan, a pudgy, overly sensitive street vendor sells red carnations to the public, mainly female, and is generally quite friendly -- unless someone ridicules his flowers; then he strangles them. He also has a "mum" at home that has never seen a good day in her life, and his crimes may go undetected because the police inspector is successful only by accident. Muddying the confusion is a second strangler with more than one maladjustment. Sijan has inserted filmic references to other horror movies -- such as the 1931 Frankenstein with Boris Karloff and from that same year, M with Peter Lorre -- for some extra zip in the action. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Nikola Simic
- 1983
In this slightly abstruse film, especially for anyone not familiar with the revolutionary fervor among East European students in 1968, a revolutionary who idolizes Che Guevara and has his own small group of followers, comes up against a mass of students at a university demonstration. While an actor declaims lines spoken by Danton from a play on the French Revolution, the devoted Che disciple stands up and exhorts the students in his own rhetoric, leaving them confused. In the end, he falls to his death from a window, and another "revolutionary" dressed up as Karl Marx picks up the sheets of paper of Che's writings near the dead man and continues on his way. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Danilo "Bata" Stojkovic, Rade Markovic, (more)
- 1980
Also known as Who's That Singing Over There?, this bittersweet 1980 comedy was released in its native Yugoslavia as Ko To Tamo Peva. The time is 1941: a crowded bus travels over unpaved Yugoslavian terrain. In the manner of Stagecoach, the audience comes to know and grow fond of the various passengers: the lovers, the politician, the eccentrics, etc (each character is played by a well-known Yugoslav movie personality). The film's genial mood is unexpectedly shattered when a Nazi bomb scores a direct hit on the bus. The only surviving passengers are a pair of travelling gypsy musicians--hence the film's title. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Pavle Vujisic, Dragan Nikolic, (more)
- 1982
Sometimes handling the dead can be almost as difficult as handling the living, according to the Topalovic family and its many members -- from great-grandparents on down. They are losing ground in the fight to keep their cemetery business from going under and have had to make a clandestine alliance with n'er-do-well entrepreneurs that will supply them with recycled coffins at a cheap price -- an alliance that has kept the family in heavy debt to the grave-digging crooks. Meanwhile, young Mirko Topalovic has fallen in love with the daughter of one of the increasingly wealthy partners in the used coffin business. She works for a movie theater as a pianist (it is the era when silents are on the way out) and the owner of the theater has not yet fired her and switched to talkies because he wants her for himself. He suggests that they make a movie together -- an erotic movie he thinks to himself -- but seduction is his only goal. When Mirko starts to help out in this movie project, he comes to realize what is actually going on and overpowered by rage, he kills the woman and the theater owner. Puffed up with his aggressive deed, he goes home to convince the Topalovic family that they have to take up arms against the usurious grave-diggers -- and a wild and bloody melée ensues that will determine the fate of the family. Jelisaveta Sablic won the "Best Actress" award at the 1982 Pula Film Festival for her role as the sought-after female lead in this film. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Bogdan Diklic, Danilo "Bata" Stojkovic, (more)
- 1988
The daughter of a wealthy American entrepreneur is sent to a monastery on a remote Yugoslavian mountainside, where it is rumored the monks have developed an exquisite cognac recipe. The money-making American wants his daughter to get the recipe so they can market the spirits. Things complicate when she falls for a very good-looking monk. ~ All Movie Guide
