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Zavet (Promise Me This)

by Lev Sluzhitel | January 2008

Every now and then, the world of cinema offers select, reclusive film-makers whose films we await in wonder, whether due to the redolence of their cult status, or the breadth of their previous work. Serbian filmmaker Emir Kusturica seems to fall somewhere in between. Having released cult favorites such as When Father Was Away On Business, Time of the Gypsies, Underground, Black Cat, White Cat, and Life is a Miracle, Kusturica has assertively placed himself at the forefront of Serbian cinema. His movies, often interweaving the mystical with the dramatic and the comic, so precisely depict socio-political discourses running parallel to the surreal, that it appears close to being a formula; this depiction, nonetheless, seems to further propel Kustrica's cult status with a fetishized aroma.

While that introduction may be seemingly unnecessary, it must be said that his newest film Zavet (Promise Me This) doesn't carry the wealth of qualities attributed to Kusturica's former concoctions. Sure, there is plenty of absurdity, lunacy, bestiality(!), and even the occasional display of "magical powers", but as strange as it may sound, it does not carry the mystique, or for that matter, the kind of plot that feels ever-present in his other works. The acutely simple story of a grandson's promise to find a wife in the city is disrupted by an unnecessarily noisy slew of characters that are to be expected of him, ranging from mafia-boss perverts to offbeat, guitar-playing businessmen. The acting carries a forced undertone, turning the subtle sub-text characteristic of his previous works into an indecipherable mimicry of itself. The substance that previously mesmerized viewers seems to be absent; or present so insincerely that it is almost offensive. The hands that made the movie appear to be tired but impulsive, which leads one to wonder if Kusturica is making movies for the sake of making movies. The overall treatment of Promise Me This is closer to a music video than a film, which is ironically one of its strongest traits. The soundtrack is outrightly brilliant, suggesting that Kusturica may simply have had the urge to create a visual accompaniment to the music of his son, Stribor Kusturica. Overall, the movie reeks of carelessness, which is an unfortunate illumination on the future of Kusturica's film-making.

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