Grbavica: The Land of My Dreams (2007)

It is a performances centric movie

In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

Great story, amazing characters, superb action, enthralling cinematography. Yes, this is something I am glad I spent money on.

Worth seeing just to witness how winsome it is.

. "Esma's Secret, Grbavica". Bosnia Hercegovina, Language Bosnian. Surprise Berlin 2006 Golden Bear prize winner by Jasmila Žbavićs is set in postwar Sarajevo. The Yugoslav wars of the early nineties have been largely forgotten in the wake of subsequent world events. However, over a decade later the wounds of the merciless conflict between Serbia and succession state Bosnia still stokes the coals of regional filmmakers. This gripping film stars Mirjana Karanovic as a war widow Esma, and Luna Mijović as her beautiful but troubled teenage daughter. Daughter wants to believe her missing father was a Bosnian martyr (shaheed) but is shocked when her mother reveals that she was raped by Serbians so her father would have been a Chetnik rapist. Very powerful. Jasmila Žbavićsm is a femme director to keep an eye on.

Whenever I watch film connected to Sarajevo I am touched to the bottom of my soul.So much was said about this film, that I do not have anything much to add except if you like films on ex Yugoslav theme this is a must see.Jasmila Zbanic always wanted to be a film director, and when you have a talent like she has it has to happen. I know the war stopped her for some years to become a successful film director, but she survived the war and she made it. Many Sarajevans can not say the same, dead mouth do not speak. On that theme watch other film made by Zbanic For those who can not tell the tales.Jasmila since we are the same generation growing up in a relatively small city like Sarajevo is, we knew all about each other. I also wanted to be a successful film director, may be I would of, if I did not like the other kind of films you do not like. You know those when actors have no clothes on while acting ;) May be the words you uttered: Petar Matic can not be a film director because he likes porn! condemned me for ever. Since that damnation happened all was bad for me, I would never have a real chance in life, not to say film directing was lost for me for ever. I know I did some semi professional work but that was really not good. I would give myself 1 out of 10 for those pitiful film directing I tried. You simply have to have training in the best film schools in order to make it. I never got to it. I thought there was time. Time expired for me.

This is a truly sad but beautiful masterpiece. We have heard so much about wars and atrocities that go with it. What about people who still have to live with all the nightmares and aftermaths of the atrocities on their own land, which they had once loved in an unrestrained and uninhibited manner but is now tainted with horror and sins? What have they done to deserve a life like this and what actually keeps them going but not giving up? Zbanic gives us the answer - it is love, the love of your family, the love of your home, despite it being a kind of contaminated, qualified and conflicting love which is eternally tainted with gruesome memories and haunting flashbacks. The nationalistic song sung by the students and in the end, an unsettled Sara, on the bus sums up this theme neatly and concisely.A very genuine and down-to-earth movie which speaks so much for itself and for the victims of war crimes who are and will still be living in a war of their own emotions for the rest of their lives. Besides, the direction is simplistic with a classy emotional twist powerfully built up to the climax of the scene of Esma's confession. The ending scene is a lifetime unforgettable. No words, just a song but it sums up what Sara has to feel and say perfectly. The acting is superb, expectedly from the veteran Karanovic and pleasantly surprisingly from the teenage Luna Mijovic.It is worth in the least Oscar nominations for the best director and the best foreign film . Go and watch it!

Winning the Golden Bear at the 2006 Berlin International Film Festival, Bosnian writer-director Jasmila Zbanic arrives with an emotional belter in her debut feature, "Grbavica". All the more relevant now in its quietly disconcerting post-wartime musings, the film packs all the wallop of a shotgun to the gut with the revelations sowed from the secrets held between a mother-daughter pairing of waitress, Esma (Mirjana Karanovic) and her pubescent daughter Sara (Luna Mijovic). Sara, a wartime baby, believes her father to be a hero for the cause and a monetary benefit that derives from that belief spurs her inquisitive nature that begins to unsettle Esma. Alluding to bankrupt masculine values in the region among other things, the film's raison d'etre is to remind audiences of the echoes of war and the numerous communal crises still facing its people. "Grbavica" falters when it shows too much leg and too little narrative flexibility when leading up to its devastating conclusion, marvelously acted upon by its leading ladies.