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Movies Forum Index » Movie Reviews Forum » Retrospective: Mondo Bobo (1997)
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| Author |
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| Dragan Antulov |
 Posted: Wed Oct 15, 2003 11:10 pm |
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MONDO BOBO (1997)
A Film Review
Copyright Dragan Antulov 2003
The author of this review is often faced with a dilemma when
appraising titles that come from countries with weak film industries -
whether to make judgements solely based on the films' merits or to
moderate them by taking specific economic and political
circumstances into account. For me this issue was especially
important in 1990s, when I had to think hard before reviewing those
films made in Croatia. On one hand, most of those films were
atrocious (and this is the view generally accepted not only by
Croatian public, but also by overwhelming majority of critics); on the
other hand, war, economic woes and semi-authoritarian regime could
hardly be fertile atmosphere for great movies. So, when few titles
actually turned out to be a notch better or in some way different than
depressingly low average, the critics had the urge to praise them
more than they actually deserved. The author of this review admits
that he succumbed to such urge in case of MONDO BOBO, 1997
drama written and directed by Goran Rusinovic.
In 1997 MONDO BOBO entered Croatian film history by being first
film in independent Croatia to be produced without government's
assistance. Until that time, all titles were either produced or co-
produced by Croatian state television or co-financed by government.
This financial independence was mirrored by the use of black-and-
white photography, non-professional actors and style usually
associated with American independent cinema. The theme was
originally taken from real life - case of Vinko Pintaric, notorious
murderer who had evaded police for years only to go down in
spectacular gunfight in at the very eve of 1991 war and thus become
Croatia's biggest crime celebrity. Rusinovic got very interested in
story and had a bizarre idea of casting Davor Gobac, one of Croatia's
biggest rock star, in title role. But some compromises had to be made
- the protagonist became fictional character and it was played by
professional actor Sven Medvesek.
At the beginning, unnamed protagonist of MONDO BOBO owes lot
of money to some nasty gangsters and has to kill one and wound
another in self-defence. After that he listens to the advice of his
attorney (played by Svebor Kranjc) and surrenders to police. He is
put into psychiatric hospital and from there he escapes only to have
his wife killed by police during the pursuit. From there his journey
takes incredibly violent path, resulting in deaths of innocent people
that happened to be around him at the wrong time.
MONDO BOBO could have been exciting thriller, serious crime
drama or Tarantinoesque black comedy. Unfortunately, Rusinovic
sacrificed substance in favour of style, so to say that the movie has
problems in connecting with audience would be an understatement.
The characters are simply too bizarre, and that includes a protagonist
who is obviously a schizophrenic. The plot is burdened by non-linear
narration, and black-and-white photography is just the most obvious
homage to Jim Jarmusch. MONDO BOBO suffers from poor editing,
especially in the final gunfight scene, which is overlong and looks
more like a garage band videoclip than part of feature film. However,
MONDO BOBO is generally watchable film, mostly thanks to few
incredibly funny scenes involving Svebor Kranjc and Davor Urban,
another of Croatia's rock stars, enjoying himself in the role of gang
boss who shoots people while dancing.
For the real assessment of MONDO BOBO, it would be best to
compare it with Vinko Bresan's KAKO JE POCEO RAT NA MOM
OTOKU, not independent and more conventional, but definitely
better title. A year before Rusinovic's film, Vinko Bresan showed that
Croatian movie industry can make comedies and bring domestic
audience to the theatres. Rusinovic's film proved that Croatian movie
industry can have independent sector and produce art films. But it is
the former that is remembered today as success, while the other is
nothing more than an experiment.
RATING: 4/10 (+)
Review written on October 15th 2003
Dragan Antulov a.k.a. Drax
http://film.purger.com - Filmske recenzije na hrvatskom/Movie Reviews in
Croatian
http://www.ofcs.org - Online Films Critics Society
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X-RAMR-ID: 36026
X-Language: en
X-RT-ReviewID: 1207324
X-RT-TitleID: 10003377
X-RT-AuthorID: 1307
X-RT-RatingText: 4/10 |
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