A Serbian Film Blu-ray Review
Allegory my a**.
Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman, October 8, 2011
There's only so far high minded rhetoric can take you, and Srđan Spasojević's perhaps (
perhaps) believable
insistence that his
A Serbian Film is an allegorical indictment of the horrors the Serbian people have suffered at
the hands of a "monolithic," abusive government only goes so far to make this evidently intentionally disgusting film
understandable. It can never be palatable under any circumstances and it similarly can't be dressed up and/or toned
down with any
strategy of apology, supposed context, or other exegetical methods.
A Serbian Film has been banned in a large
number of countries, and I can't say I'm that upset about it. I don't take that position lightly. There's no finer freedom
than that enjoyed by artists seeking to express themselves. I may disagree with supposed creative types who drown
crucifixes in urine and the like, but shock tactics like that seem almost quaint when thrust up against the horrors that
await the viewer in
A Serbian Film. Were some of the film's more hideous elements staged? No doubt. Does
that make them any more acceptable? Certainly not. The film tells the story of a washed up porn star named Miloš
(Srđan Todorović) who has managed to more or less retire into a life of happy domesticity, with a beautiful, highly
intelligent wife named Marija (Jelena Gavrilović), and an adorable little boy named Petar (the child playing this role is
uncredited, something he may thank the Gods for as he grows up). The film opens with Petar evidently hypnotized by
watching some of his father's old porn movies, and if you think that's a questionable scene, it pales in comparison to
any number of horrors which are yet to come, including Petar himself involved in both a sadistic scene where the child is
brandishing a mutant sized dildo and a much later scene where the child himself is the victim of sodomy. The basic plot
(if it
can be called that) has to do with Miloš being lured back into his old profession with promises of untold riches if he
agrees to participate in an "art film" about which he can know nothing. This premise may remind astute film historians
of like-minded fare such as
Dead of Winter, but in this case, Miloš' ignorance doesn't lead to the amputation of a
finger (as it does in the Mary Steenburgen film) but to the desecration of both male and female genitalia, among other
shockingly gruesome images.
Even if Spasojević is given the benefit of the doubt about his motivations and aims in
A Serbian Film, the
question
must still be asked: why did the ostensible subject matter (as opposed to what's actually on screen) have to be
supposedly allegorized this
way? Certainly
degradation, corruption and moral bankruptcy are not new, and the controversy swirling around any number of
previous
films which depict these traits rages to this day (as evidenced once again with the fairly recent Blu-ray release of
Salò or 120
Days of Sodom, to give just one salient example). But Spasojević's approach is so completely, ludicrously hyperbolic
that any point the filmmaker is attempting to make is immediately drowned beneath the onslaught of grotesque
imagery
and frankly appalling violence and sexual depravity. From the standpoint of this reviewer, there is no way
A Serbian
Film's overkill (literally and figuratively) can be justified, whether or not one pins it to the recent sociopolitical turmoil
in
and around Serbia.
Eli Roth was both curiously vocal and curiously ambivalent about
A Serbian Film. His comments and tweets
about the film perhaps
brought it greater worldwide renown, but in at least one interview even Roth talks about the film setting up an
intriguing premise and then
becoming little more than one ultra-violent scene after another. Roth compares
A Serbian Film to
Human
Centipede, insofar
that both films intentionally sought to push the envelope of what audiences could actually stomach. Roth avers that he
found the disturbing
imagery in
A Serbian Film somehow easier to take than that in
Human Centipede if only because he was
certain that the
scenes in
A Serbian Film were faked. While that may be true some of time, I as the parent of two boys had to
wonder how they
faked the scene of a very young male slinging a gigantic dildo like it was part of a hula hoop. There are also a number
of questionable
dialogue scenes with this same child, including one where the kid talks about his growing feelings of sexuality after
watching his Dad's porn,
feelings he likens to little wheels inside his privates. He asks his father how to deal with the feelings and dear old Dad
encourages him to
follow the feelings with his hands. Now mind you this is not a prepubescent teen we're talking about, this is a
very young boy. How
were those scenes "faked"?
A Serbian Film has achieved whatever questionable cachet it's enjoying due mostly to it having been banned
and censored in
virtually every country where it's been shown. That of course brings out the voyeur in all of us, the craning neck
syndrome that insists on
seeing what we've been told we
can't see. It's interesting to note how many mainstream critics, even those
who gave
A Serbian
Film passing marks, said they never wanted to see the film again under any circumstances. If that's something that
appeals to people,
that indicates the film is some sort of masterpiece, I guess it's pointless to argue about it. I'm sure there's a potent
allegory to be made
about the atrocities Serbia has suffered over the past several decades, but my personal opinion is that
A Serbian
Film is quite simply
too disgusting to ever capably make any kind of serious point.
For a somewhat divergent opinion on this film, I direct you to my colleague Svet Atanasov's review of the UK edition.
A Serbian Film Blu-ray, Overall Score and Recommendation
The reigning question on our Forum devoted to
A Serbian Film seems to be whether this is the uncut version. While
the box lists a 103
minute running time, it actually clocks in at 1:41:57, i.e., just short of 102 minutes. That said, from what I can glean from online
commentary, this
version has at least most of the incredibly questionable footage intact. The fact that this subject is what is deemed most
pressing about
A
Serbian Film simply makes my point for me, albeit probably unintentionally. Those who will want to see this film
seemingly couldn't care less about any
ostensible allegorical content, content the film's director insists is its sole reason for being so exploitative. Some people at
least are in it for the shock value, and that's it. For those people, have at it. There's certainly no more shocking
film available than this one. For those wanting some meaning behind the horror, keep on looking.
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