Review: Cinema Komunisto

In the late 1940s he was instrumental in setting up Avala Film, a mighty studio complex that would eventually produce hundreds of flag-waving war movies about the glorious revolutionary fervour of Tito’s wartime partisans.

By the 1960s production had exploded, attracting international figures of the calibre of Alfred Hitchcock, Kirk Douglas, Yul Brynner and Sophia Loren. And with Hollywood came the dollar, further propping up Tito’s regime and his image as a benevolent dictator.

Today as former producers, studio heads and film stars reminisce, Avala is slowly rotting away.

Both a fascinating detective story and a powerful spotlight on what was once a powerhouse of film production, Mila Turajli’s documentary is a reminder of how far and how fast the mighty can fall.

From Tito’s death in 1980, his studio complex began to decline. And with the murderous divisions of the civil war came a wish to 
wipe away memories of the past.

The film’s most poignant moment comes as Živojinovi tours a musty museum devoted to his films. Barely any of them travelled outside Yugoslavia, and even his hits are now considered passé.

On limited release