05/08/2024
This Sunday at DokuKino, we kicked off with two documentaries in the Balkan Dox competition: Exit through the Cuckoo’s Nest, directed by Nikola Ilić, and Woods that Sing, directed by Renata Poljak.
Ilić’s documentary offers a personal perspective on how life is systematically and thoroughly altered when wars and conflicts dictate every aspect of a person’s existence. It explores the decay experienced by an artist whose vibrant performances and dreams are overshadowed by immense historical changes. The story follows a soldier who never wanted to be a soldier, capturing the vulnerability and futility of those who do not accept violence but are still forced to obey orders they reject.
The documentaries contrast themes of liberation and rebellion with the constraints of a strictly defined existence. Abilities that once served as sources of pleasure sometimes become tools for survival. The shift of qualities being transferred into different areas and structures of living spark many conversations on the utility of human perserverence and adaptability to different contexts that demand a quest for survival and restrictions.
Both Poljak’s and Ilić’s documentaries employ personal and subjective approaches to tell their stories. Poljak uses diaristic and archival elements to narrate the characters' experiences from a first-person perspective, while Ilić draws on personal archives to reflect not only on his own situation but also on that of his generation.
Woods that Sing offers a crucial perspective on women who became partisans and recount their stories much later. This retrospective, informed by various past experiences, provides new ways to understand courage, war, service, and the structured regimens women built. In the conversations the audience can understand clearly the impact the lives they led, have still remained with them, telling their stories with grace and easiness.
Through diaries and audio/visual recordings, we follow these women’s stories of overcoming and surpassing threats, uncovering the traumas and what might have been if their choices had been different.
These compelling narratives offer an insight on the importance that these personal archives can turn crucial into understanding the intimate perspective and the lives of ones, if told poignantly enough can pinpoint the feel and context of time, and additionally remain a testament to the power of stories being told.
We urge you to watch these films, which will be screened again on August 5 at Lumbardhi indoor at 15:00.
By: Blerina Kanxha
Photo: Tughan Anit
