My Best Dox

Being in the right place at the right time has always been a mark of a good documentary filmmaker. However, what distinguishes a brilliant filmmaker from a mere chronicler is the way they shape the filmed material into a coherent cinematic whole. In his film The Verdict, Đuro Gavran films the crowd, decorated with nationalist symbols, gathering in Zagreb’s main square to see the live broadcast of the trial to Croatian generals in The Hague. In a Diane Arbus manner, Gavran manages to capture the almost grotesque moment when the faces of individuals at the moment of sentencing change from euphoria to teary-eyed disappointment. Still, the formal precision of this film’s making and editing makes it possible to take a dignified distance from the protagonists and gives us food for thought about the real motifs that stimulate these people to use nationalist iconography as compensation for their sorrow, trauma or disappointment.

Mario Kozina