Želimir Žilnik

Europe Next Door

Director	Želimir Žilnik
Country of production:	Serbia
Year of production:	2005
Duration:	61 min
Sound:	Marko Cvejić
Camera:	Miša Milošević, Jovan Milinov
Editing:	Marin Milošević
Cast:	Roko Babičkov, Suzana Vuković, Ana Vilov, Slavica Vračarić, Ištvan Levai, Tereza Cetina
Production and distribution:	Terra Film

Film plot

Želimir Žilnik's film follows the effects of the Schengen Agreement on the Hungarian-Serbian border over a period from summer 2004 to spring 2005. In the form of a docu-drama he gives local merchants and farmers an opportunity to talk about their experiences and to show how they live and work.

Želimir Žilnik is the author devoted to contemporary topics, which include social, political, and economic criticism of a daily life. His first films were documentaries: Journal about Youth in the Country, in the Winter (1967), Little Pioneers, We’re Quite an Army, Every Day Do We Grow like Green Grass (1968), Unemployed People (1968), and June Events (1968). Student protests in 1968 are the topic of his first feature film "Early Works" (1969). The "Early Works" was immediately forbidden to be screened, with the argument that it insulted public moral and had bad influence on youth education. At Berlin Festival, the film was awarded with Grand Prix. After the screening of his new film, "Freedom or Comic" (1972), was forbidden, Žilnik immigrated to Germany. In Germany, where he shot a serious of documentaries on immigrants, Žilnik created the documentary "Public Execution" (1975). This film is the only German documentary banned immediately after its origination. In it, the director deals with South American terrorist gang which was, immediately after the robbery, killed in front of TV cameras. In late 70s, Žilnik went back to Yugoslavia, and continued his work on documentary, rare feature films, and documentary TV dramas. Until 2001, he shot eight feature films, 27 documentaries, and 11 TV dramas. All these creations have a recognisable author’s characteristic – both in thematic and poetic sense. Besides the films "Pretty Women’re Walking through the Town" (1985) and "This is how the Steel Was Tempered" (1988), where the leading roles were played by professional actors – in all other ones – both documentaries and feature films - Žilnik mostly engaged non-professional actors. In the majority of cases they play themselves. In Žilnik’s films of 90s, such as "Tito among the Serbs for the Second Time" (1994) and "Marble Ass" (1995) the non-professional actors also play roles. Želimir Žilnik’s film opus was marked with a recognisable author’s style: minimalist film poetics, the demystification of various social concerns, and exceptionally cheap films in sense of production.