A Film a Week - The Lost Dream Team / Izgubljeni Dream Team

 previously published on Cineuropa

Sports are often the source of national pride and unity: the whole nation tends to come together and stay behind an individual or a national team. But in the former Yugoslavia and the countries that succeeded it, fandom for an individual sportsperson or a national team is raised to the level of mythic adoration. National sports-powered “mythos” sometimes even gets epic proportions in an “alternative history” imagination. Some say that the collapse of Yugoslavia became possible after the unfortunate loss of the football national team against Argentina in the quarter-finals of the 1990 World Cup in Italy. Others harbour a conspiracy theory that the Americans were so frustrated with their college basketball players losing to Yugoslav teams that they forced the International Olympic Committee to change the rules regarding the professionals competing and created their own dream team of the best NBA players.

After a fantastic career in the short format crowned with the 2015 EFA award for Picnic and his fiction-feature debut Mater (2019), Croatian filmmaker Jure Pavlović has decided to try a new format – the feature-length documentary combining sports and the political drama of the Yugoslav basketball national team’s last hurrah at the European Championships in Rome in 1991. The premiere of The Lost Dream Team closed the 72nd edition of the Pula Film Festival. Judging by these events’ place in the collective memory all over the West Balkans, and by the rather universal angle Pavlović takes to accommodate international audiences, the film should have a healthy festival run, a theatrical release in several countries, and a prolonged exposure on television afterwards.

Throughout the 1980s, the Yugoslav men’s basketball national team became a powerhouse at continental and world championships, as well as at the Olympics, with players like Dražen Petrović, Vlade Divac, Toni Kukoč, Dino Rađa, Saša Đorđević, Predrag Danilović amongst others. The match in the finals of the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona never took place because Yugoslavia ceased to exist a year before, and the dissolution was followed by a bloody war. It was in fact during the very week of the European basketball championship in Rome that Slovenia and Croatia seceded from Yugoslavia and the short-lasting war in Slovenia broke out. After winning the championship, the national representatives did not have a country to return to.

Jure Pavlović interviews all the players from the national team as well as their head coach Dušan Duda Ivković and the team manager, but the focal point is Jurij Zdovc, the only Slovenian on the team, who was called by the government of his “new country” to leave the national team (and his comrades and friends) because of the Yugoslav aggression on Slovenia. Zdovc was also the focal point of a newspaper article written by Croatian journalist and novelist Boris Dežulović that actually inspired Pavlović to take a dive into the topic and the memory from his own childhood.

The result is a finely made classical documentary mixing sports and politics, to cathartic effect for the audience that remembers the events, and creating curiosity in younger spectators. Pavlović's approach, combining national television and private archives as well as newly shot interviews with the players and staff members, functions well thanks to the slickness in Dario Hacek’s camerawork, Julij Zornik’s masterful sound design and Ivan Vasić’s editing which turns the talking heads mode into something more artistic. The Lost Dream Team might seem like a simple piece of nostalgia, but it is also a deeply moving piece of cinema.

Mater

kritika pročitana u okviru izveštaja s Black Nights Film Festivala u emisiji Filmoskop na HR3

Svakako najznačajnija novost za hrvatsku kinematografiju je svjetska premijera dugometražnog prvijenca Jure Pavlovića, Mater. Pavlović inače u svojoj karijeri ima EFA nagradu za svoj kratki film Piknik (2015), te stoga slovi za jednog od autora koji obećavaju u europskim, ako ne i svjetskim okvirima. Film Mater natjecao se u konkurenciji debitantskih filmova. 

Junakinja filma Jasna u interpretaciji maestralne Darije Lorenci Flatz nakon dužeg odsustva dolazi iz Njemačke da bi se brinula o svojoj ozbiljno bolesnoj majci Anki (Neva Rošić), sa planom da se u rodnoj kući zadrži onoliko koliko treba, dok se majčino zdravstveno stanje ne poboljša ili dok je, po savjetu liječnika, ne premesti u starački dom. Majka, međutim, ima posve druge planove, ignorira liječničke savjete i napreže se poslom u i oko kuće i vrta, sa susjedima se spori za "metar zemlje" na međi i općenito odbija suradnju. Majka i kći imaju povijest sukoba koji nadilazi generacijski jaz, životne stilove i navike. Kao predmet sukoba se iz pozadine pomaljaju otac i brat, obojica pokojni, a prilično su jasne i natruhe da je Jasna u djetinjstvu i mladosti bila žrtva fizičkog zlostavljanja koje se u ono doba nazivalo "discipliniranjem", te da je jedva čekala da se skloni i od obitelji i malograđanske sredine neimenovanog dalmatinskog, odnosno neretvanskog gradića. Međutim, kako vrijeme prolazi, što Pavlović potpisuje tekstualnim karticama "Dan", "Tjedan", "Mjesec"... majka kopni, a ne popušta u otporu i vrijeđanju svoje kćeri, Jasna osjeća sve veću tjeskobu...

U svom dugometražnom debiju Pavlović uspješno slika portrete na tri nivoa: od Jasnine psihe koja se urušava po stiskom balkansko-mediteranske inačice patrijarhata i, još izraženije, gerantokracije, preko obiteljskih odnosa punih trzavica, pasivne i otvorene agresije, pa do učmale sredine gdje se svi poznaju i tračaju, gdje liječnici baš i ne znaju svoj posao, gdje "fiškali", poštari i rodijaci "njuše" novac i naslijedstvo, ma koliko sitno bilo i gdje starije osobe te iste stvari, ali i odumiruću moć koriste kao sredstvo pritiska i ucjena, a gdje Jasna ipak nadljudskim naporima nalazi trenutke radosti u društvu daljih rođaka i prijatelja iz školskih vremena. 

Dok se koncept priče može nazvati standardnim za mizerabilizam sa lokalnim štihom, te operira u sličnom svijetu kao dugometražni prvijenac Hane Jušić Ne gledaj mi u pijat, Pavlović ipak uspjeva pronaći svoj autohtoni glas služeći se inteligentnim režijskim riješenjima. Kamera Jane Plećaš je prikovana za Jasnu, njeno sve umornije lice ili potiljak u dugim kadrovima i izrazito plitkom fokusu u kojem se sve osim nje muti do neprepoznatljivosti, sugerirajući Pavlovićev dubinski fokus na svoju junakinju. Takav pogled je atipičan i za mladog autora i za osobu muškog roda - Pavlović se bavi sredovječnom ženom koja je odrastala kao nevoljeno ili makar manje voljeno dijete u konzervativnoj obitelji i koja, nakon što je uspjela razbiti kanon svojim odlaskom, sada ispašta u ulozi sluškinje koja joj je namijenjena. 

Film, doduše, ima i svojih nedostataka, prije svega u smislu scenarija i montaže - riječ je o nepotrebnim repeticijama u zadnjoj trećini filma kojima se ne govori ništa novo u narativnom smislu, niti se pojačavaju atmosfera i ugođaj, zbog čega je očito Pavlovićevo kratko-filmsko profesionalno "porijeklo", ali je jasno da je riječ o filmu inteligentnog autora pred kojim su tek velika djela.