Underground
|
Our Price: $149.99 Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours Buy Used: from $49.95 (click here) Category: DVD See more DVD releases |
|---|
Buy this DVD movie at online store in your country
Canada
Canada
Movie Reviews of Underground
Movie Review: A haunting tale of Yugoslavia's peak and breakup through magical realism
Summary: 5 Stars
Emir Kusturica's 1995 film "Podzemlje" (Underground) represents the rise and disintegration of Yugoslavia through magical realism. Marko (played by Predrag Manojlovic) and his best friend Petar, nicknamed Blacky (Lazar Ristovski), are idealistic enough to join the Communists but still while away their days drinking and carousing. As the film opens, they are returning home quite drunk, riding through the whole city with an entire brass band in tow. This boisterousness and joie de vivre, one of the charms of Balkan countries, returns many times throughout the film.
But when Nazi Germany invades Belgrade, joy is mixed with sorrow and heartwarming friendship with deception. Blacky becomes a wanted man, and Marko convinces him and other civilians to go underground, into a shelter fashioned from an old cellar. In order to have Blacky's wife Natalija (Mirjana Jokovic) to himself, Marko keeps up the illusion that the war is on for twenty years. A whole generation grows up in the cellar, while outside Tito rules a peaceful Yugoslavia. When in 1960s the inhabitants decide to leave the cellar and fight against the Germans they still think occupy their city, tragedy ensues.
The film could have ended there, and no doubt those who watch it without enough knowledge of Balkan history will probably wish it did. Nonetheless, what comes next is the most poignant part of all. Marko, Natalija, and Blacky meet one last time in a Bosnian war zone in 1992. It is Kusturica's howl of pain that what was once a single country has brothers killing brothers. Indeed, the film was originally subtitled "Once Upon a Time There Was a Country". And the ending is skillfully done, touching upon ancient themes of European folklore and providing true and inspiring closure after all of the story's violence.
Kusturica uses what were then novel special effects, putting Marko and Natalija into historical footage of national politicians like in FORREST GUMP. Every scene is authentically portrayed, with no feeling that the budget was an issue. Goran Bregovic's soundtrack for the film has a permanent place on my iPod and that of half of my friends. He ties together Balkan Gypsy traditions, the music of the Shopluk/Shopsko region divided between Serbia and Bulgaria (hauntingly sung by Snejanka Borissova), and old Slavic wistfulness.
I imagine that this film is not for everyone. I first encountered the film while living in Romania, where its atmosphere was immediately familiar to viewers. Average Americans watching it, on the other hand, might find the film confusing and strange because they don't know the details of Yugoslavian history and have no direct experience with Balkan society. Nonetheless, it is an excellent production, which will stay with those viewers who "got" it long after its close.
Movie Review: A wild, extravagant fable Yugoslavia's history
Summary: 5 Stars
As with Kusturica's "Black Cat, White Cat," it's almost impossible to summarize the plot of this film. Suffice it to say that the film is a quasi-realistic fable of perhaps 50 years in the history of Yugoslavia, beginning during WWII. It has everything - love, betrayal, greed, tragedy, comedy - even a touch of magic now and then.
I love the pure extravagance of this film. A tiger, trapped in ruins, reaches for the head of a defiant swan. An elephant steals a pair of shoes from an open, 2nd story window. A young woman flies through the air to her waiting groom - attached or not to a battering ram? Blacky, an electrician, has seemingly infinite resistance (pun intended) to torture by electrical shock - not to mention that he sleeps with his eyes wide open and charges on-stage while his lover is performing, ties her on his back, and carries her away.
And all this is done at the pace of the Marx Brothers on speed and with NO reliance on computer-generated graphics. It's all from the creative brains of the writer/director/cinematographer team. Forget realism - just take a ride on the back of this film and try to catch your breath!
Movie Review: A bitter nightmare !
Summary: 5 Stars
Kusturica won The cannes Festival in 1995 defeating a superior film as Ulysses gaze . Nevertheless it would be unfair not recognize its deep values .
Kusturica shows the complex web of outrageous characters who live in the middle of the bloody war a surrealist episode which itself constitutes a crime even major against the hopes and the lives of a lot of people .
Since the times are hard , a mercenaire and miserable man sees in the personal tragedy of hopeless people your way of living .
And in this sense he builds a solid fortress in the underground of his own house , privating of any possible escape . So this refugee will become a real prison .
The war is over but he maintains in them the belief the war continues . As they live isolated from the outside world , they assume that statement and make our lives in that sordid place. Watch this merciless and awful film . The arresting script of Kusturica is finely variegated with intelligent and smart vignettes who reminds us to Fellini .
A great film that together with Time of gypsies are the alpha and omega of this talented film maker .
Movie Review: The movie explains why Yugoslavia fell apart
Summary: 5 Stars
If you ever wondered why all those wars in Yugoslavia broke out, don't watch documentary films about it, watch this movie. I am originaly from Yugoslavia, and I know how horrible that war was. And why did it brake out? Why did Serbs kill Croats, Croats kill Serbs,...? Why did brothers kill brothers when they all lived together under Tito only 10 years ago? Is Milosevic to blame? No, if the people didn't want to kill each other, they wouldn't have elected him. To find out the reason why it happened, we have to analyze WWII in Yugoslavia a little better. Thats exactly what this movie does. Even if you're not Yugoslavian, you will feel sad at the end of the movie. Yugoslavs are not crazy, war-loving animals, we are just hungry for party's, tuba music and just having fun. After seeing this movie, you will have a new understanding for the Balkans conflict and probably will be very mad when you hear someone say "Yugoslavia fell apart because those Slavs are nuts". I think that Emir Kusturica is a genius, and you will understand why when you see this movie.
Boris, from Vancouver (originaly from SUBOTICA, YU)
Movie Review: Not to go with the rest of your movie collection!
Summary: 5 Stars
If you have a DVD shelf do not group this movie with the rest of your collection. It deserves a throne, a piedestal to sit on all by itself, above everything else that has ever flickered over the silver screen. This movie is not seen, it is lived, expirienced, read like a book. The metaphors and similies in this movie equal any in any poem or a novel. Raw, inspired, dark, and bitter, it will twist your guts into a knot, which is precisly what the 50-odd years of history of the region it symbolizes does (Ex-Yugoslavia '41-'95) It is amazing how this movie manages to offer images and idealogy to represent the social changes in the society as well as mental changes in the people of the region.
On the next level, cinematography, acting, directing are all unrivaled, if at times overemphasized and overdone (but that's Kusturica for you)