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Reviews of Recent Independent, Foreign, & Documentary Films in Theaters and DVD/Home Video
AT THE CROSSROADS: SLOVENIAN CINEMA
GUARDIANS OF THE FRONTIER WHEN I CLOSE MY EYES Slovenian cinema is not a phrase that is frequently bandied about, even by the most astute cinephile. Yet this month’s presentation of At the Crossroads: Slovenian Cinema at the Film Society of Lincoln Center offered the opportunity to become acquainted with a country whose cinema is a budding movement worthy of such a spotlight. Two of the presented films, When I Close My Eyes, and Guardian of the Frontier, deserve particular note as being somewhat emblematic of what Slovenian cinema has to offer. Netflix alert: both are available on DVD, along with 2003’s Spare Parts, also featured in the festival. The two films give voice to the complicated history of the country, revealing a nation coming to grips with its complicated, multi-faceted identity as an up-and-coming member of the European Union, less than two decades ago a communist nation before its independence from Yugoslavia in 1991. Well, maybe not exactly coming to grips, as both of films deal with characters on a quest, which spins out of control. When I Close My Eyes (1993) begins elliptically with a young girl stumbling upon her father’s dead body tied to a tree. Nearly 10 years later, mousy Ana (Petra Govc) now works at a sleepy post office on the day it is robbed. Her strange attraction to the mysterious criminal is the catalyst which begins her exploration of sexuality and her questioning of authority.
She assists the police in catching the robber, up to a point. (Shortly after the robbery, she helped herself to some money.) Like her country, she undergoes a transformation, cutting her long, unkempt hair and turning into a sleek femme fatale, but her actions seems to be more perilous to herself than to anyone else. Meanwhile, she puts off the advances of an aggressively wooing local politician who entices her with the prospect of better job, which she would have had if her father had not been branded as a foreign agent before his death. It’s a fascinating, gritty film, somehow reminiscent of the pungent script-based cinema that has been coming from Romania in previous years. Govc gives a splendid performance as the tormented Ana, and the script really drives home the role that her newly liberated country plays in her journey. Similarly Guardian of the Frontier’s three college friends—the provocateur, the prude, and the ponderer—take off on a canoe trip down a river which divides Croatia and Slovenia shortly after a woman’s body has been discovered in the water. The absurdity of international borders is highlighted during a swim—the far bank is Croatian, and it is illegal to set foot there. In an act of defiance, Zana (Pia Zemlji) swims to the other side. In parallel with the journey of Ana, each of the three women search for a personal definition of independence. In a similar fashion to the young men in Alfonso Cuaron’s Y Tu Mama Tambien, they are exposed to a variety of facets of their national heritage and remnants of the recent splintering of Yugoslavia. At one point, they dock their canoes on the Croatian side of the river and find themselves eyed suspiciously by villagers, but welcomed into the home of a former actor and his male partner. While the reserved Simona (Iva Krajnc) finds the men's gay lifestyle morally repugnant, Zana and Alja (Tanja Potonik) eventually give into their sexual attraction for the other. The three find themselves viewing the countryside like they never had before. They witness Chinese migrants cross into Slovenia and then get beaten and rounded up by the police. Their youthful naïveté is contrasted by the somewhat maniacal presence of the “guardian of the frontier,” a local politician who closely monitors the border and seems to almost stalk the trio’s journey. They happen upon a traditional village festival where the guardian speaks to a cheering crowd on the perils of homosexuality and the ways in which the city corrupts the countryside, before he touts “Slovenia for Slovenians.” Even with a killer on a loose, the film poses the question of what is the real terror facing the women. Guardian
of the Frontier
(2002)
is a beautifully photographed film, if not a little forced at times,
that comes together beautifully. With an ominous Ennio Morricone-like
score, it begins as a thriller, not unlike the
recent women-in-peril The Descent, and ends as a surreal (thanks to Simona’s over-the-top fantasies)
and meditative look on change. It is not insignificant as well that this
is the first major Slovenian film directed by a woman.
Dustin L. Nelson
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