A recent release notes the following: CineStar Cinemas, part of the Blitz Group, sold 378.007 tickets for the film Wedding and achieved a record income of 2.740.374 euros. The data was forwarded by the PR team of the Croatian cinema chain that has been working in Serbia for years, and to that should be added the number from the local "box office": the same film in Serbia attracted as many as 130.058 viewers in its first four screenings, including the premiere, in front of the cinema screens. This could be the end of the presentation of this - as well as any other, after all - repertory or commercial film, that film, therefore, which without further ado is addressed to as many and demographically diverse audiences as possible and whose goal, of course, is to be a hit in the first place, a watched film whose drinkability and communicativeness are obvious, and there is little point in questioning these properties. Nevertheless, it is not a bad idea to try to point out the scope, that is, the qualities of even those works that were done according to the formula, if for no other reason than to weigh whether the applied and, in this case, effective formula can be transplanted to some new attempts. Hits, namely - and especially such racial and quickly confirmed ones - are never enough.
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THE MOTIVE OF GALLIMATY
Wedding screenwriter and director Igor Sheregi catches the eye easily and quickly and cannot be confused with anything else. And, as it usually happens in all such or at least sufficiently similar cases, it is extremely/extremely good that it is so. Such a circumstance always points to the self-awareness of the author, and it also provides us with an extremely precise context within which we should look for criteria for measuring his quality. formally, Wedding is a Croatian film and in some form a co-production between Croatia and Serbia (without the participation of the Film Center of Serbia), but its essence is still significantly more interesting - this is a Croatian film, but made according to an easily recognizable cut, according to which Serbian folk and folk film comedies were once created. And, of course, there is nothing particularly questionable there either. But at the same time, it is intriguing how Šeregi (the co-writers are the local Marko Backović and Marko Jocić) in Weddings shifted, rotated and welded all the force of light Serbian film stylistic tropes (this is already evident in the aggressively marketed trailer and campaign), and therefore perhaps it should not be surprising that a good part of those interested believe that this is actually a Serbian film with local stars (Dragan Bjelogrlić, Vesna Trivalić, Jelisaveta Seka Sablić, Srđan Todorović, Anđelka Stević Žugić...) and with lesser-known actors from western neighborhood. Misunderstood marketing niceties aside, Wedding it quickly emanates the spirit of a noisy Serbian folk comedy, with a frenetic rhythm in the attempt, taking over from the local heritage of repertory film a plethora of references and starting points, and, among other things, it also seems like a gimmick Zika's dynasties, of Brenna's films from the triptych Let's love each other (let's remember that at least one of the films from that franchise largely takes place on the Adriatic Sea), and there are also traces of Srđandragojević's poetics.
If it is at all necessary to clarify, Wedding is a fairly disjointed Balkan auto-balkanization comedy, in which, seemingly, opposing national mental, generational and worldview identities collide, all through the story of a collision between the family of an impoverished-disgraced Croatian tycoon and a Serbian minister. Both parties will have to overcome their own differences, tension and anger when they find themselves in the rough and when the lovers' wedding proves necessary. U Weddings a lot of quick moves were made, and no one should be surprised by the force of commonplaces, quick and easy solutions that lead to the confirmed goal: to make a full-blooded cinema hit. Stereotypes have ossified ideas that are (necessarily) not true, and that is precisely why members of two bloody family camps were brought to the stage, whose leaders, at the same time, strive to enter the Eastern market with their companies, that is, to bypass the Croatian barrier to European support for the ill-fated Serbian metro project in Brussels. On that track, it can easily be stated that, completely in line with the expectations of a more informed viewer, Wedding a film of tried-and-tested solutions, economical dramaturgical structure and architecture, and quick characterization of characters who are anyway set as stereotypes. The narration flows in neatly demarcated three acts with clear seams on the borders of mutual separation of introduction, elaboration and necessary conclusion. In that sense, Wedding represents a big step forward compared to Sheregi's previous feature-length film - a completely failed and barely acceptable comedy ZG80 from the lives of football fans from the late SFRY era, which was largely filmed in Serbia and with a significant share of Serbian actors, and in which, to mention at least, the motivation of the main characters was exhausted by the heartfelt desire to somehow find time on the way to and from the derby in our capital and urinate on the grave of Dragan Mance. Not only on that basis, Wedding is a more articulate and mature story, with stronger motive, cause-and-effect and characterization essences.
COMEDIAN INSTINCT
However, this is also a film of open oversimplification (which is not inevitable when it comes to a repertoire film with no hidden commercial ambitions), to the extent that it can bring some joy of quick recognition to a more well-intentioned and less demanding viewer. If we exclude the certainly effective René Bitorajac in a finely balanced partnership with Dragan Bjelogrlić, who is also experienced in this field, the problem is the obvious balance between magnetism and comic instinct between the Serbian and Croatian actors. This applies to almost all couples (Vesna Trivalić-Linda Begonja, Jelisaveta Seka Sablić-Snjejana Sinovčić), while Roko Sikavica heroically holds her own in that unnecessarily imposed duel of acting superiority with her partner - Anđelka Stević Žugić, who, together with Denis Murić from the shadows, achieved the most successful comedic creation. All in all, this is a film that will be enjoyed by both supporters and fans of fast-paced acting, except for the rather awkward Nika Grbelje and Marko Grabež in the roles of newlyweds, who had nothing special to do and show with the not-so-knowledgeable and unnecessarily passivated characters of the newlyweds, obviously not overly interested in the habits and prejudices of their elders. In addition, the entire subplot with the ex-girlfriend, a disgraced stripper looking for quick fame, seems extremely grafted, forced and intrusive, and as such, it hardly served the purpose of the final vicissitudes. In some of the scenes (say, in front of the church before the wedding) there are traces of haste and rashness, with a complete absence of a more thought-out mise-en-scene, and this may also indicate the production circumstances. Here we should also add a noticeable drop in rhythm in the final third, where targeted freneticity gives way to a debatable rhythm and faltering efforts to make this story of superficial conflicts and highly feigned drama even more appealing to the audience.
However, everything said largely falls into the water in front of the impressive figures from the first paragraph of this report. Both in Croatia and in Serbia, the repertory film is still weakly rooted, but without hits, perhaps, soon there will be no cinemas in which, if there is justice, there will still be room for something more special, ambitious, creative and valuable than Šeregi's. Wedding and similar titles. In this regard, congratulations on your success and thanks for your efforts.
