BROKEN SPEARS - COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF A MIRACLE (1971) BY ĐORĐE KADIJEVIĆ AND FALCON (1981) BY VATROSLAV MIMICA
Posted: Sep 30th 2008
Author: Aleksandar Novaković
This work attempts to find the reasons for the small number of films in Serbian cinematography concerning medieval period of our history. Serbian nation has a long history (at least 1500 years) and only a few films about it. The reasons for such absence are found both in the Communist regime that ruled this country for half a century and in the lack of interest in films concerning national history. Analyzed films, Čudo (A Miracle, 1971) and Banović Strahinja (Falcon, 1981) are both based on national epics depicting the times of battles with Ottoman Turks in the 14th and 15th centuries. This paper sees a crucial distinction between them: A Miracle is a strong, suggestive film made for TV about a fight of a dying nobleman, Dojčin, for honor of his murdered sister. A lone hero, deserted by everyone except his wife, Dojčin is presented as a Serbian counterpart of Kurosawa’s samurai or lone gunmen/gentlemen in western films. On the other hand, Falcon was filmed as a would-be spectacle, Yugoslavia/Western Germany co-production, starring Franco Nero as Banović Strahinja, Serbian nobleman who pardons his wife\'s betrayal. A Miracle is seen as representative of the potentials of Serbian history and epics for serious film-making and a possible role model for the future attempts in this field, while Falcon shows the traps and possible mistakes in an attempt to satisfy the foreign expectations while betraying the qualities inherent in the original Serbian epic poem.
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