In
his interview regarding the film’s world premiere at Belgrade
International Film Festival, Afterparty writer-director Luka
Bursać made a point that he was not criticizing social
tendencies among the youth in Serbia particularly through the prism
of Belgrade clubbing scene, but merely noting them. It sounds so
smart and neutral, but it is also impossible. Usually, filmmaking is
not a sociological research that can note something in an objective
way, filmmakers have to have a standpoint, and try to point their
views out the best way they can.
The choice to open the film with the archive material of building of
New Belgrade, one of the biggest 20th century newly
founded settlements in the world, is a filmaker’s decision. The
choice of main characters, a bartender / wannabe-actor Mare (Rade
Ćosić), his next-door neighbour
/ part-time love interest Tića (Jana Milosavljević) and his
drug-dealing bouncer buddy Stefan “Chinese” (Nikola
Šurbanović), that all live in the same block and work at the
same nightclub is also a filmmaker’s decision. The choice of
surroundings, drab gray buildings, lazy days and heated-up nights is
also a filmmaker’s decision. The choice of music, bad techno, bad
hip-hop and Serbian special called “turbo folk”, is also a
filmmaker’s decision. The choice of clothing for both male and
female characters and extras is also a filmmaker’s decision. The
choice of finishing the film with blending images of the “old New
Belgrade” and contemporary clubbing scene and nail the point with a
pseudo-existential pseudo-philosophical quote about going places and
getting there taken form a “turbo-folk” song is a filmmaker’s
decision.
It
should carry some weight as a standpoint. And it would in the hands
of a more skilled director. But here, all of the decisions and
choices seem just random, disjointed, futile or just plain weird,
attempting and failing to shock for its own sake. Sometimes the whole
thing is offensive, cringe-worthy and completely uncalled for.
Unlike
much of the contemporary Serbian cinema, Afterparty has no
visible problem with its production value. The film actually seems
more expensive than it probably was, with its clubbing scenes with a
bunch of extras and copyright-protected music. However, almost every
theme party in the club looks and sounds pretty much the same, just
like some Serbian trash music video clip, but that can also be a
comment of sorts. What gets lost in there is the character of the
club owner Gagi, played by usually terrific Dragan Jovanović
who is kinda boorish, but neither intimidating (as a character like
that should be) nor funny (as the actor’s persona usually is), and,
well, not even seen clearly because of the dimmed lights.
What
the film lacks is the basic idea what to do outside of the club. We
have some outlines of the story about Mare, his acting career, his
on-again-off-again hooking up with Tića and his parents played by
mismatched duo of late 80’s TV actors Slobodan Beštić and
Lidija Vukićević, which is one of the rare touches of
inspiration, sadly not developed into something more meaningful. We
know a little bit about Chinese, his business and his family
situation and sometimes we even see another of their buddies called
Wig (Vladimir Gvojić) who is a comic relief of sorts. But it
goes nowhere and takes a lot of time to get there. The payoff and its
pseudo-funny punchline in the end is too weak and not worth the
bother to see the whole film.
Instead,
we get a casual bashing of another Serbian film, Stevan
Filipović’s Skinning completely out of the blue, a
casino robbery without any sort of explanation, some forced
politically incorrect humour, a really bad
porn moment and a fine share of wtf moments. How come an actor cannot
tell the difference between a globally popular TV series and its bad
gay porn parody just by its title? How come the producers of the same
gay porn offer him a girl for a test shooting? Why does every
apartment look exactly the same with the
same outdated furniture? Why does a Spanish tourist speak English
with a heavy Balkans accent? We could let any one or two of those
things slide, but the sheer amount of them makes the case against the
film.
Even
if we dismiss all of that simply as Bursać’s weird sense of
humour, there are some undertones of
misogyny that cannot be overlooked. Up until one particularly
disturbing scene, Afterparty can go under the radar as a
misjudged, undercooked, weak mixture of “New Belgrade depression
movies” from the beginning of millennium and movies about
over-sexed aimless youth a la Clip. After that, it can be seen
just as a vile little film. Sometimes not taking stand is simply not
an option. And not trying to tell anything can be considered talking
trash. Unlike his brave and prvocative diptich social realist drama /
science fiction debut Blackness (Tmina, 2013),
Afterparty is a huge miss.
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