A Serbian Film () is a 2010 Serbian exploitation psychological horror thriller film produced and directed by Srđan Spasojević in his feature directorial debut, with Aleksandar Radivojević co-writing. It tells the experience of a financially struggling pornstar who agrees to participate in an "art film", only to discover that he has been drafted into a snuff film with pedophilic and necrophilic themes. The film stars Serbian actors Srđan Todorović, Sergej Trifunović, and Jelena Gavrilović.
Upon its debut on the art film circuit, A Serbian Film generated substantial controversy for its depictions of graphic violence and sexual content. The film has been banned in numerous countries including the Philippines, Ireland, China, New Zealand, Australia, Malaysia, and Norway, and was temporarily banned from screening in Brazil and Spain. It also required compulsory cuts in order to be released in the United Kingdom and despite being shortened by six minutes, it received an NC-17 rating in the United States, though it was later released uncut by Unearthed Films. The film's notoriety has continued to the present day, and a number of sources have described A Serbian Film as the single most disturbing film of all time.
Plot
Miloš, a semi-retired pornographic actor, lives in Belgrade with his wife, Marija, and their six-year-old son, Petar. His brother Marko is a corrupt police officer who envies Miloš's life and is sexually attracted to Marija. Lejla, a former co-star, offers Miloš a starring role in an art film directed by Vukmir, an independent pornographer who wishes to cast Miloš for his powerful erection. Not informed of the details of Vukmir's film, Miloš is hesitant to participate and continue his career, but accepts to secure his family's financial future. While meeting Vukmir, Miloš passes a bald man and his entourage, regarding them warily.
The filming begins at an orphanage, where Vukmir feeds Miloš instructions through an earpiece given by Vukmir's one-eyed driver Raša, while a film crew follows him. Miloš sees a young girl named Jeca, who is being scolded by her mother for disgracing her deceased war hero husband's memory by becoming a prostitute. In a dark room, Miloš is fellated by a nurse while screens show Jeca eating an ice pop. In the next scene, Miloš is forced to receive fellatio from the mother while Jeca watches. Marko later informs Miloš that Vukmir is a former psychologist who has worked in children's television and state security. Vukmir meets a hesitant Miloš afterwards to explain his artistic style, showing a film of a woman giving birth, followed by the newborn being immediately raped by Raša, in what the director terms "newborn porn". Miloš storms out and drives away. At a road junction, he is approached and seduced by Vukmir's female doctor.
A bloodied Miloš awakens in his bed three days later with no memory of what has happened. He returns to the now-abandoned set and finds several tapes. Viewing them, Miloš discovers that he was drugged to induce an aggressive, sexually aroused, and suggestible state. At Vukmir's manipulative direction, Miloš beats and rapes Jeca's mother before decapitating her, and later, a catatonic Miloš is sodomized by Vukmir's security. He then watches footage of Lejla voicing concern for Miloš, only to be restrained as her teeth are removed. A masked man enters the room and forces his penis down her throat, killing her by suffocation. The footage continues as Miloš is led to Jeca's home, where her grandmother praises him for killing her mother and offers Jeca as a "virgin commune". Miloš refuses and escapes through a window. He calls Marko from a payphone and asks him to pick him up. However, Raša arrives and drives Miloš back to the warehouse with Vukmir.
At the warehouse, after Vukmir's doctor administers more drugs, Miloš overpowers her, sticking the syringe into her throat. He is then taken into a room to have intercourse with two hidden bodies under a sheet. Miloš is guided onto one body and the masked man from Lejla's film begins sexually assaulting the other. Vukmir reveals the masked man to be Marko. Marko's victim is revealed to be Marija, while Miloš's is revealed to be Petar. Vukmir's doctor staggers into the warehouse, her vaginal area covered in blood. She is holding a bloodied metal pipe in her hand, implying that she masturbated with it after being injected with the same drug she used on Miloš. As she falls dead from vaginal hemorrhage, an enraged Miloš lunges at Vukmir and smashes his head against the floor, initiating a brawl during which Marija bites Marko in the jugular before bludgeoning him to death with a sculpture. Miloš wrestles a gun from a guard and shoots all but Raša, whom he kills by shoving his erect penis into his empty eye socket. A dying Vukmir praises Miloš's actions as truly worthy of a film.
Miloš, having recalled his actions, including locking his family in their basement before passing out earlier, returns home and frees them. Traumatized, Miloš and Marija come to a mutual understanding that they and Petar should die together, so the three gather in bed and embrace before Miloš fires a fatal shot through himself, Petar, and Marija. The next morning, another film crew enter the bedroom. As one man unzips his fly, the director (the bald man seen earlier) instructs him to "start with the little one".
Cast
Themes Speaking more than a decade after the film's release, its writer Radivojević discussed the specifics of the material for what would eventually become A Serbian Film being gathered over a period of ten years, starting in the late 1990s from a film school screenplay idea of his that the Belgrade University of Arts' Faculty of Dramatic Arts (FDU) dramaturgy student initially developed only as far as a synopsis titled Orgazmatron. Radivojević further revealed that, when it comes to the general framing of the original screenplay idea, he drew inspiration from the porn star and filmmaker Rocco Siffredi's 1990s cinematic exploits:
After graduating, Radivojević became friends with fellow budding filmmaker Srđan Spasojević, a film direction graduate from 's Academy of Arts. Bonding over their similar cinematic tastes—mutual appreciation of Paul Schrader's Hardcore as well as Brian de Palma's Dressed to Kill, Alfred Hitchcock's Spellbound, and David Lynch—the two young men began collaborating professionally. However, unable to get multiple cinematic projects off the ground in Serbia throughout early-to-mid-2000s, the duo grew frustrated with their country's film industry—financially completely reliant on the European Union (EU) arts council grants as well local Ministry of Culture and public service television funding. In 2022, Radivojević discussed his and Spasojević's professional struggles via looking back on Serbia's 2000s cinematic output:
In March 2009, six months after the shooting wrapped, the film's director Spasojević and writer Radivojević stated that the film, at that point still unreleased, is a parody of modern Serbian-made politically correct films that are financed by foreign arts council funds such as Eurimages. Commenting on the decision to connect the movie to the country via the title, Radivojević replied: "We have become synonymous with chaos and lunacy. The title is a cynical reference to that image. A Serbian Film is also a metaphor for our [Serbian] national cinema—boring, predictable and altogether unintentionally hilarious which to a certain extent is commented on and subtly parodied throughout our film." Similarly, Radivojević dismissed Serbian cinema as "pathetic state-financed films made by people who have no sense or connection to film, but are strongly supported by foreign arts council funds", while adding: "the quality of their films is of no concern to them, only the bureaucratic upholding of the rule book on political correctness."
In a May 2010 interview, while the film was being screened at festivals, Spasojević stated the film "denounces the fascism of political correctness". Questioned by the Croatian media on whether the violence depicted deals with crimes committed by Serbian soldiers during the Yugoslav Wars, Spasojević answered: "A Serbian Film does not touch upon war themes, but in a metaphorical way deals with the consequences of post-war society and a man that is exploited to the extreme in the name of securing the survival of his family."
While promoting the film's December 2010 UK theatrical release, Spasojević stated that the character of Vukmir is "an exaggerated representation of the new European film order", adding: "In Eastern Europe, you cannot get your film financed unless you have a barefoot girl who cries on the streets, or some story about war victims in our region ... the Western world has lost feelings, so they're searching for false ones, they want to buy feelings."
Release Film festival circuit The first ever showing of A Serbian Film took place on 15 March 2010 at midnight in Austin as part of the 2010 South by Southwest. During the introduction by Alamo Drafthouse Cinema's owner Tim League, the audience in the theater was once again warned about the extreme nature of the scenes they were about to see. He also coaxed a handful of audience members to join him on the stage – where they jointly snorted lines of salt, squeezed lime juice into their eyes and took shots of tequila in order to "understand what Serbians have been through to create a culture of A Serbian Film." The next day, a brief report from the screening appeared in the blog section of The Wall Street Journal web site thus giving the movie its first piece of U.S. corporate media press, with the WSJ reporter expressing shock not so much at the film's content but at the fact "it looks like a relatively expensive production, moves along at a competent pace and includes solid performances, indicating the filmmakers' serious intentions lurking beneath the surface."
Next was a screening at the Brussels International Festival of Fantasy Film in April 2010 where the movie also received a lot of attention over its shocking content.
On 11 June 2010, the film had its premiere screening in Serbia as part of the Cinema City festival in Novi Sad. Due to high demand resulting from the press buzz that the movie had been generating throughout preceding months, the festival organizers decided to schedule additional screenings.
The film was run on 16–19 July 2010 during the Fantasia Festival in Montreal as part of the Subversive Serbia program.
The film was due to screen on 29 August 2010 at the Film Four FrightFest in London, UK but was pulled by the organizers following the intervention of Westminster Council. Films shown at this festival are usually shown pre-certificate but in this case Westminster Council refused to grant permission for its exhibition until it had been classified by the BBFC. Following its DVD submission to the BBFC (there were no theatrical materials available in the time frame requested for a proper theatrical classification), 49 compulsory cuts totaling four minutes and eleven seconds were ordered for DVD certification. The UK distributor, Revolver Entertainment, initially looked into the possibilities of the process, but it became clear that the film would then have to be resubmitted to the BBFC and further cuts may then have been required. It was decided that to show a heavily edited version was not in the spirit of the festival and consequently its exhibition was pulled from the schedule. The film was replaced at the festival by Rodrigo Cortés' Buried starring Ryan Reynolds.
The Raindance Film Festival, that picked up the film at the Cannes Film Festival in May, subsequently held the UK premiere and "found a way around the ban by billing the screening as a 'private event'." Westminster Council requested to monitor the invitations to the screening. The 35 mm print was shipped from the BBFC for 8 October 2010 premiere.