IN THE LAND OF BLOOD AND HONEY

Bosnia/US, 2011, 126 minutes, Colour.
Zana Marjanovic, Goran Kostic, Rade Srbedzija.
Directed by Angelina Jolie.

While the first half of the 1990s saw the fall of the Soviet Union and the end of apartheid in South Africa, it also saw the vicious wars in the Balkans and the genocide in Rwanda. We have been reminded of all these events, the good and the evil, in many films. This film shows us the years 1992-1995, Serbs and Bosnians, ethnic cleansing, mass murder atrocities and the siege of Sarajevo, the longest since World War II. While we have seen Savior, Welcome to Sarajevo, Grbavica and Storm and other Balkan War films, this film does not shirk the bitterness, the prejudice and the bloodshed, but it also wants to suggest ambivalences through a love story in the savagery of the war. That it cannot end happily in the 1990s is not a surprise.

The biblical image for peace is a land flowing with milk and honey. An image for war is a land flowing with blood and honey (the former abundant, the latter in short supply).

We see cruel round-ups and deportations, women forced into servicing the soldiers, cooking and sewing but also as victims of repeated rape. We see guerilla attacks, sniper shootings in the streets and the massacre at Srbvenicia.

But our principal focus is on a young woman, an artist, Ajla (Zana Marjanovic), beautiful, Muslim, who is in love before the war with a Serb policeman. When she is rounded-up with a group of women and interned, she is protected by her policeman (Goran Kostic) who is now a military leader. The screenplay voices the difficulties, the feelings of guilt, mutual recriminations as well as a deepening love. The military man is pressurized into wariness of the Muslims by his father, a commanding general (Rade Srbedzija) who resents his family’s past servitude to the Muslims, the cruelty exercised on them during World War II. We understand, while we are horrified, how he can relentlessly pursue ethnic cleansing. His scene with Ajla where she sketches his portrait and he delivers his angrily hostile speech, brings home the horrors of Balkan history, ethnic and religious bigotry.

Of course, there is the Angelina Jolie factor. She has written the screenplay and directed the film, obviously with sensitivity, especially towards the women and their abuse and pain and humiliations. They are, for her, a cause worth making a film about. The screenplay, while highly critical of the Serb attack, shows the complex issues on both sides – and the world observing but not intervening until years had passed. Not many audiences saw Angelina Jolie and Clive Owen in Beyond Borders (2003), a film too difficult for the average audience (which, unfortunately, might be the case here) which took up issues in the famine in Ethiopia in 1984, the atrocities in Cambodia and political issues in Chechnya and the work of UN agencies. But that film and this one show that Angelina Jolie is preoccupied, not just with glamour and her career, but also with the social conscience. It would be a pity to overlook this film because of any difficulty with her celebrity status.

1. The 1990s in terms of war and peace, the end of apartheid, the collapse of the Soviet Union? The contrast with the wars in the Balkans and the genocide in Rwanda? The need for memories to be retained? Dramatised?

2. The background of the Balkans wars, the Serbs, protecting Europe from the Ottoman Turks? The Bosnian Muslims and their ascendency? The subservience of the Serbs? Cruelties on both sides? Vengeance? Ethnic issues, religious issues? The speech of the general explaining the history, his family history? The television news and the overviews of the history?

3. The work of Angelina Jolie, writing and directing, her concerns, humanitarian issues, issues of women, victims and abuse? The information in the epilogue?

4. The focus on Ajla, her paintings, her sister, women in general? The sufferings of women? Crimes against women?

5. The portrait of men, harsh, soldiers, killers, laughing at their violence? Yet tenderness, caught in ambivalent situations? The final declaration by Danijel that he was a war criminal?

6. The film made in the Bosnian language, the locations, the mountains, the cities, the bombardment, Sarajevo and the siege? The musical score and its atmosphere?

7. Ajla and her painting, the end painting? Her paintings of her sister? Babysitting, love for the baby, the happiness of the family, Muslim – but not strict? Going to the dance, with Danijel? The band and the songs? The sudden bomb and the consequences?

8. The war and the Serbs, the attack, their motivation, history, ethnic cleansing, the roundups, the brutality, the murder of the baby because it cried, the women chosen for internment? Taken to the country, serving the military?

9. The nature of the servitude, cooking, sewing, the public rape? Ajla being saved by Danijel? The dormitory, the few possessions, their clothes, working, the men and their brutish behaviour, their drinking? Sexual preoccupation?

10. Ajla and Danijel, his saving her, helping her, urging her to escape, her attempt and her being bashed? Ajla with the other women, the raped woman? The elderly women, stripped and humiliated?

11. The snipers, the shooting, the guerrilla attacks? Ajla’s sister and her escape, going to the headquarters, the plans? Tarik and his meeting Ajla, her second escape? Tarik being caught, tortured, giving the information, Danijel hearing about Ajla?

12. Danijel, his police background, the family, going into the military, becoming a commander, the loyalty of his men, Darko and his pregnant wife, Petar and his brutality? The dominance of his father, his father’s speech inciting hatred, explaining the war, the family history? Danijel and his setting up of Ajla, and her painting?

13. Ajla and her room, the paints, Danijel’s portrait? The earlier interactions and her refusing to talk, her mellowing, loving Danijel, time passing, her life, listening to the men?

14. The report to Danijel’s father, his coming, demanding a sketch, his speech about family and hatred, allowing Petar in for the rape?

15. The effect on Danijel, his attacking Ajla, the sexual behaviour, killing Petar?

16. The confrontation with his father, his father’s hatred? Srebrenica and the massacre of the men and boys? Madeleine Albright and the television information? The United Nations? The Serbs meeting and rejecting the UN? President Clinton and the bombings?

17. Danijel taking Ajla to the gallery, her wonder at the paintings, fingering them? Her joy?

18. Danijel, going on the raid with the snipers, the church and its explosion – Ajla and the information for her to have her meal, indicating that he was safe? His arrival, confronting Ajla, her giving the information to the partisans, her being sorry, Danijel killing her?

19. Danijel, walking towards the United Nations soldiers, giving himself up as a war criminal?

20. The blend of war and love story? Ordinary people, in horror situations? And the significance of the title?