In order to pay for a life-saving operation for his son, a quite normal man signs a pact with the devil and becomes a solitary murderer.
The deed soon starts hounding Mladen: keeping the secret from his wife forces him into a kind of emotional poker, and his conscience also doesn't cooperate very long in this betrayal of his own moral standards. A "Balkan version of 'Crime and Punishment'", as director Srdan Golubović writes, set against the backdrop of a transition process gone awry: "a modern 'film noir' about post-Milošević Serbia, where there is no more war, just a moral and existential desert." Golubović vividly dissects the personality transformations from the perspective of a confession, always showing great respect for his protagonists. With its distinctive language of images, which finds a style of its own between close-ups and the representation of urban architecture, the film reveals an artistic approach to the theme that points beyond empty metaphors at the personal quality of the story – a story whose pull can't be refused.
Bernd Buder
Production: Film House Bas Celik, Belgrad; Mediopolis GmbH, Leipzig; UJ Budapest Filmstudio, Budapest
Screenplay: Srdan Kogiević, Melina Potakogiević, based on a play by Nenad Teofilović
Cinematographer: Aleksandar Ilić
Cast: Nebojša Glogovac, Anica Dobra, Miki Manojlović, Nataša Ninković
Format: 35mm, Color
Running time: 106 minutes
Language: Serbian
