MEN DON'T CRY / MUŠKARCI NE PLAČU

The armed conflicts of the 1990s not only visibly destroyed the land of the former Yugoslavia, but also left the deepest wounds in the memory of each of its belligerent nations. There are as many different interpretations of that bleak past as there are countries affected. It is therefore hard to expect absolute harmony when, less than two decades since the war ended, a diverse group of veterans gathers at a remote mountain hotel for a therapy session over several days. On the contrary, such a dangerously volatile situation can suddenly ignite by just one thoughtless word, or a seemingly dirty look.

„In the summer of 2010, I signed up for a training event that a peace organization offered to war veterans from former Yugoslavia. My primary aim was to conduct a research that was to serve as the basis for a short documentary. Having myself been a soldier in the Bosnian war, I thought that such a workshop would be the best possible immersion into the ”story”. So that was my primary motivation for participating in the workshop. As for my personal experience of the war, I believed I had long since left it behind. I thought it was a closed chapter in my life. 
But the workshop captured me completely. I was sitting with people who had literally fired shots at each other. Or, to put it more precisely: we had fired shots at each other. There was tension, yes, but what started in an atmosphere of mistrust and discomfort eventually turned into a quite uncommon relationship of understanding and compassion.  
Emotional tensions, unusual dynamics in communication and, finally, the catharsis experienced in the workshop have made me decide to make a feature film on the subject.“
Alen Drljević