- Occupation
Producer, Director - Country
Croatia
Dević Goran
I have nothing nice to say to you
The story of the unsolved murder of Ljubica Solar, a young woman from Sisak, which happened in 1991 spurred the director to talk about the generation of young people he himself belongs to and whose lives have been greatly influenced by the recent war and who face the eternal small town dilemma whether to leave or stay.
Masturbation Among Croats
Like many other transitional countries, Croatia became rather conservative. In it's own, funny way, this film is investigating the area of autoeroticism. People masturbate, even the Croats...
Weekend in Sisak
The Flood
Kosinj and neighboring villages, passive parts of Lika are tormented by floods every twenty years or so, due to heavy rains and snow melting. Villages, couple of kilometers away from river Lika are under water. The whole region becomes one huge lake where the only communication mean is by boats. Film follows stories of two volunteers - during the flood, each of them becomes the only link with the rest of the world for their respective communities, Serbian and Croatian.
Don Juans: Excuse Me Miss
The basic narrative line of this documentary follows a rather peculiar workshop held in Zagreb. The aim of the workshop was to teach the participants one very basic skill – how to seduce a woman in order to get her to bed. Our documentary is following changes, fears, small successes and big misunderstandings of the twelve workshop participants. The participants were heterogeneous, coming from different countries (Austria, Germany, and USA) and were of different skin color. This interesting group of people had two things in common: they found themselves in the school benches in Sheraton hotel in Zagreb and they all have one goal - to seduce a Balkan girl.
Three
"Do we still need to keep talking about the war?" is the motto of this documentary by Goran Devic, who has decided to conduct confessional interviews with three men who were actively involved in the conflict in the former Yugoslavia. The first is the Serb Novica Kostic, who despite his best efforts fails to avoid conscription. During the war he was injured and he now recalls how easily a person can be turned into a "killing machine". Another protagonist is the rough-edged and slightly cynical Croat Ivica Petric, who joined up voluntarily and was convicted after the war for the murder of 16 Serb civilians. The last of the three is Narcis Misanovic, who saw his father and brother killed in front of his eyes. At the age of 11 he was already working in a military canteen and a few years later was fighting among the ranks of the Bosnian army. These interviews recorded during car journeys really bring the fratricidal conflict home to the viewer. Even though all three fought on different sides, they all agree on the inhumanity and absurdity of the war, the fact that politicians bear the blame, and that today everybody behaves as if nothing happened.
Happy Country
We follow the preparations, journey and arrival of two busses to their final destination: the first bus’ “victorious” passengers are traveling from Rijeka to Kumrovec to commemorate and celebrate Tito’s birthday by visiting his birth house, the second bus going from Zadar to Bleiburg “ships” the elderly and “defeated” as well as ideal youngsters to this historic place of defeat. What happened in these two busses is an expression of opposite ideo-logical positioning, for the author however it turns out to be something even more. Being an outsider and observer, he was caught by the ways these events manifested themselves in a dramatic and emotional “sameness”. What appeared to be most important was that the passengers in both busses lived in the past. This could have been perceived as “normal” and “reasonable” if the passengers in the busses were eye-witnesses and participants of the Second World War, but a large a gap exists between the generations of the Second World War and the majority of other passengers. Still, the past has bridged the gap and the memory of it has become our trans-generational heritage.
Two Furnaces for Udarnik Josip Trojko
Two Furnaces for Udarnik Josip Trojko shows the remains of what used to be a large iron industry, follows the disassembling and cutting into pieces a famous Siemens-Martin furnace which used to be the heart of former forge. In that furnace, the workers beat the world record several times in producing steel. Sons of those workers, with unhidden emotions, are slowly destroying the furnace, cramming it into a goods van which leaves the forge.
The story of the unsolved murder of Ljubica Solar, a young woman from Sisak, which happened in 1991 spurred the director to talk about the generation of young people he himself belongs to and whose lives have been greatly influenced by the recent war and who face the eternal small town dilemma whether to leave or stay.
Masturbation Among Croats
Like many other transitional countries, Croatia became rather conservative. In it's own, funny way, this film is investigating the area of autoeroticism. People masturbate, even the Croats...
Weekend in Sisak
The Flood
Kosinj and neighboring villages, passive parts of Lika are tormented by floods every twenty years or so, due to heavy rains and snow melting. Villages, couple of kilometers away from river Lika are under water. The whole region becomes one huge lake where the only communication mean is by boats. Film follows stories of two volunteers - during the flood, each of them becomes the only link with the rest of the world for their respective communities, Serbian and Croatian.
Don Juans: Excuse Me Miss
The basic narrative line of this documentary follows a rather peculiar workshop held in Zagreb. The aim of the workshop was to teach the participants one very basic skill – how to seduce a woman in order to get her to bed. Our documentary is following changes, fears, small successes and big misunderstandings of the twelve workshop participants. The participants were heterogeneous, coming from different countries (Austria, Germany, and USA) and were of different skin color. This interesting group of people had two things in common: they found themselves in the school benches in Sheraton hotel in Zagreb and they all have one goal - to seduce a Balkan girl.
Three
"Do we still need to keep talking about the war?" is the motto of this documentary by Goran Devic, who has decided to conduct confessional interviews with three men who were actively involved in the conflict in the former Yugoslavia. The first is the Serb Novica Kostic, who despite his best efforts fails to avoid conscription. During the war he was injured and he now recalls how easily a person can be turned into a "killing machine". Another protagonist is the rough-edged and slightly cynical Croat Ivica Petric, who joined up voluntarily and was convicted after the war for the murder of 16 Serb civilians. The last of the three is Narcis Misanovic, who saw his father and brother killed in front of his eyes. At the age of 11 he was already working in a military canteen and a few years later was fighting among the ranks of the Bosnian army. These interviews recorded during car journeys really bring the fratricidal conflict home to the viewer. Even though all three fought on different sides, they all agree on the inhumanity and absurdity of the war, the fact that politicians bear the blame, and that today everybody behaves as if nothing happened.
Happy Country
We follow the preparations, journey and arrival of two busses to their final destination: the first bus’ “victorious” passengers are traveling from Rijeka to Kumrovec to commemorate and celebrate Tito’s birthday by visiting his birth house, the second bus going from Zadar to Bleiburg “ships” the elderly and “defeated” as well as ideal youngsters to this historic place of defeat. What happened in these two busses is an expression of opposite ideo-logical positioning, for the author however it turns out to be something even more. Being an outsider and observer, he was caught by the ways these events manifested themselves in a dramatic and emotional “sameness”. What appeared to be most important was that the passengers in both busses lived in the past. This could have been perceived as “normal” and “reasonable” if the passengers in the busses were eye-witnesses and participants of the Second World War, but a large a gap exists between the generations of the Second World War and the majority of other passengers. Still, the past has bridged the gap and the memory of it has become our trans-generational heritage.
Two Furnaces for Udarnik Josip Trojko
Two Furnaces for Udarnik Josip Trojko shows the remains of what used to be a large iron industry, follows the disassembling and cutting into pieces a famous Siemens-Martin furnace which used to be the heart of former forge. In that furnace, the workers beat the world record several times in producing steel. Sons of those workers, with unhidden emotions, are slowly destroying the furnace, cramming it into a goods van which leaves the forge.
Goran Dević is film director, scriptwriter, and producer from Zagreb, Croatia. He was born in 1971.
Documentaries:
2009. “Sretna Zemlja”/ “Happy Land”, 51 minutes, PETNAESTA UMJETNOST
2009. “Susjedi” / “Neighbors” 25 minutes, PETNAESTA UMJETNOST
2008. “Tri” / “Three”, 26 minutes, FACTUM
2008. “Park u izgradnji” / “Park in construction”, 25 minutes, PETNAESTA UMJETNOST
2006. “Nemam ti šta reći ljepo” / “I have nothing nice to say to you”, 30 minutes, FACTUM
2004. “Uvozne vrane” / “Imported Crows”, 22 minutes, ADU
2004. “Jesam li se zajebo?” / “Was I fucking wrong?”, 17 minutes, ADU
2004. “Knin 2004” / “Knin 2004”, 30 minutes, HTV
Short feature films:
2008. “Ma sve će biti u redu” / “It will be all right”, 20 min., ADU
Feature films:
2009. ”Crnci” / “Blacks”, 75 minutes, KINORAMA
FESTIVALS AND AWARDS:
“Crnci” / “Blacks”, 2009.:
Awards:
2009. PULA FILM FESTIVAL – Zlatna arena for directing
Festivals:
2009. SARAJEVO FILM FESTIVAL
Petnaesta umjetnost
Domagojeva 14
10000 Zagreb
Domagojeva 14
10000 Zagreb