The Experimental Film Movement in Serbia: Formative Years (1950s–60s)

With the establishment of cine-clubs in Yugoslavia after World War II, the filmmakers at the front ranks of experimental (and, later, professional) cinema in Serbia in the 1950s and the beginning of the 1960s—including Dušan Makavejev, Živojin Pavlović, Vojislav Kokan Rakonjac, and Želimir Žilnik—created a number of films that used narrative experimentation to pose questions related to the essence of the socialist social system. Their professional films, made during the 1960s, displayed a deep social and political engagement that strongly shook the existing socialist society, and won the movement the name “Black Wave” (Cinema Noir) in Yugoslavia. 


ANTONIO’S BROKEN MIRROR (ANTONIJEVO RAZBIJENO OGLEDALO) Dušan Makavejev, Yugoslavia, 1957, 11 mins, B&W, 16mm transferred to Digital video

TRIPTYCH ON MATTER AND DEATH (TRIPTIH O MATERIJI I SMRTI) Živojin Pavlović, Yugoslavia, 1960, 9 mins, B&W, 16mm transferred to Digital video

THE WALL (ZID) Vojislav Kokan Rakonjac, Yugoslavia, 1960, 8 mins, B&W, 16mm transferred to Digital video

SMOKE AND WATER (DIM I VODA) Dragoslav Lazić, Yugoslavia, 1962, 12 mins, B&W, 16mm transferred to Digital video

ARMS IN THE PURPLE DISTANCE (RUKE LJUBIČASTIH DALJINA) Sava Trifković, Yugoslavia, 1962, 11 mins, B&W, 16mm transferred to Digital video

ECSTASY (EKSTAZA) Petar Arandjelović, Yugoslavia, 1963, 5:30 mins, B&W, 16mm transferred to Digital video

BLUE RIDER (GODARD-ART) (PLAVI JAHAČ (GODARD-ART)), Tomislav Gotovac, Yugoslavia, 1964, 14 mins, B&W, 16mm transferred to Digital video

Total running time: c. 75 mins


• All films preserved or restored by the Academic Film Center, Student City Cultural Center, Belgrade, and selected by Miodrag Miša Milošević. The films are shown digitally due to the fragility and uniqueness of the original 16mm prints.