Balkan Baroque is a real and imaginary biography of the Yugoslavian performance artist Marina Abramovic. Rather than a mechanical reproduction of the artist's work, the film tries to create a new reality by translating the performances into cinematographic images that intensify the fictional context of the film. Abramovic plays herself, but ,appearing in multiple forms, blurs her own identity. Memories and fantasies intermingle with day to day rituals. The chronological narrative often breaks to reflect the interior voyage of the protagonist from the present to the past and back to the present. The result is a visually impressive film. Balkan Baroque had its world premiere at the International Film Festival Rotterdam, 1999.
Nov 1999
Eat Your Enemy is a documentary about martial arts and aggression, about spirituality, winning and losing, about suffering and vanity. And about East and West, muscle and mind power. About masters and students. A film full of paradoxes. Violence and its prevention are important themes in our society, and we are each involved in one way or the other. Aggression is bad, is the prevailing opinion. We, in the West, have begun to consider ourselves too civilized to fight. We fight with words and on the off chance that something does go wrong, a trauma team is at hand. Nevertheless, people continue to have a need to fight; take the violence during soccer matches. But in fact, we don't know how to handle aggression. In this film, several approaches to the martial arts in the West and the East are highlighted. The essence of the film is philosophical, but disguised as fight. Not as much a fight against an opponent but rather against oneself.
Feb 2005
