Janko Baljak

The Anatomy of Pain

directed by	Janko Baljak
producer country:	Serbia/Montenegro
production year:	2000
duration:	30 min
sound engineer:	Igor Perović
camera:	Sandra Stojanović
edited by:	Barbara Bogavac
produced by:	B92
distributed by:	B92

Awards

Grand Prix and FIPRESCI Award at the 47th Yugoslav Documentary and Short Film Festival, PRIX CIRCOM, POSTDAM 2000.

Janko Baljak graduated from the Faculty of Drama Arts – Department of Film and TV Directing, in Belgrade. One of the founders of the film and TV production department of the independent radio station B92 which produced a great number of his documentary films. The films were successfully presented at domestic and foreign film festivals and won a number of important awards.

Filmography

Absolute Hearing (1988), A Long Life of the Kos Couple (1990), Once Upon a Time in Serbia (1991), See You in the Obituary (1995) - Grand Prix and FIPRESCI Award, 42nd Yugoslav Documentary and Short Film Festival, Ethnically Clean (1998) – Award for the Best Documentary at the 45th Documentary and Short Film Festival, 02:06 – Anatomy of Pain (2000) - Grand Prix and FIPRESCI Award, 47th Yugoslav Documentary and Short Film Festival, The Dead are Killing – Anatomy of Pain 2 (2001) – the best documentary film at the 48th Documentary and Short Film Festival, Yugend in der Twilight Zone (2001), Serbia in a Container (2003).

Film plot

During the last decade of the 20th century in Serbia, unhappy and horrible events kept replacing each other. The average spectator, either film or television, was forced to continually erase from his memory past events, thus creating place for new, usually even more tragic events. The memory of people, got used to evil that surrounded them, was getting shorter each day. Stirring, but already forgotten meetings with numerous refugees, will be left in the past and replaced by even more traumatic experiences after each adventure of the Milosevic's regime that will follow. And then, in March of 1999, war came to Serbia. NATO bombs were being dropped onto towns... One of the bombs fell on the RTS (Radio Television of Serbia) building. For a whole decade, the programme of RTS has been a monstrous promotional tool of the regime in power, which was used to generate and spread hatred. Yet, among 16 people killed that April night, there were no reporters. Irresponsible and arrogant Serbian government has left the crew of engineers as a live shield in the building. Their tragic death has been exploited by the government in their media war against the enemy. The news about the tragedy did not stop the war, nor did it change the attitude of the international community. Six months after the tragedy, the victims were remembered only by their families and a few colleagues threatened with the notice of dismissal by RTS.