The long-awaited television series Flat mountain, according to published measurements, recorded a record viewership of 2.270.000 viewers. The rating of the first episode was 19,9 percent, and the total audience share, the so-called share, was 42,6 percent. The high rating is not surprising, because the expectations of the series among the general public were also high. Namely, the announcements are based on the fact that the series will shed new light on historical facts and that the scenario, according to the author Radoš Bajić, is "argued by well-founded historical truth". In a culture where the dominant film genre dealing with the Second World War is colloquially called the "guerrilla film", Flat mountain is widely understood as the first achievement that could start the counter-genre of "Chetnik film". To that should be added the fact that modern man's awareness of history and historical events is shaped much more by the media than by historical science (See "Time" no. 749, text "Life of this picture"). Moreover, in this field, history has globally lost the battle with media, film and literature. Hence, it is no wonder that a wide audience expects to watch Flat mountain to find out new, hitherto unseen historical facts about the Chetniks and General Draža Mihailović.
However, Chetniks have appeared in popular culture, primarily in films, since 1943. No less than Hollywood introduced them to the big screen. Produced by the Twentieth Century Fox studio, from the director of western films Louis King and the screenwriter Jack Andrews, in February 1943 the film premiered Chetniks! The Fighting Guerrillas. The main character, General Dragoljub Draža Mihailović (played by Filip Dorn), after the German invasion of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, founds a guerilla group - the Chetniks. He gives the Germans a lot of trouble while his family, his wife Ljubica and children Nada and Mirko, are hiding in Kotor. The film is essentially a real Hollywood action and adventure, with a hint of romance (the secretary of the Gestapo Brokner, who is chasing Draža, Natalya, is in love with the Chetnik Aleksa). The movie Draža does not look like the real one in any way - he has a short haircut, blond, with an elegant parting, in an even more elegant uniform. Basically, the Germans expose Draza's family hiding in Kotor, keep his children as prisoners, and the Chetniks led by Draza attack the city and everything ends happily. In the last scene, Draža informs his comrades in Yugoslavia through the radio station that he will continue to fight until the final freedom.
Draža Mihailović appears for the first time as a character in a Yugoslav film, more precisely, a Yugoslav-Soviet co-production In the mountains of Yugoslavia (In the mountains of Yugoslavia). The film was directed by Abram Rum and Eduard Tise, and Draža is played by Vjekoslav Afrić, a director and actor who would later become famous as a director. Slavica (1947)
GET READY, GET READY: Nevertheless, the main pattern when it comes to film Chetniks was established by the director Veljko Bulajić, primarily through films The goatherd (1962) and Battle of the Neretva (1969). This is how the classic type of Chetnik was born, with a long and untidy beard, bloodshot eyes, with a shubara, a dagger and redenik, arrogant, bloodthirsty and dangerous. In fact, the most elaborate picture of Chetniks is present in Battles on the Neretva, where the backbone of that picture is a politician played by the famous Hollywood actor Orson Welles and a commander (played by Dušan Bulajić). The first significant appearance of the Chetniks in this film is the scene in which Orson Welles gives a speech to his comrades about how it is necessary to destroy the partisans, after which they shout wildly and take out sabers and swords and brandish them. The presence of the Chetniks is also reflected in the scenes of their direct conflict with the partisans near the end of the film, and that fight is perhaps the longest shown in the entire film. Before this decisive battle, the Chetniks sing the famous "Prepare'te se sprem' te Chetniki" while at the same time inhumanly roaring. In the final showdown with the partisans, two scenes in particular indicate their brutality. The first one is when the Chetnik commander, with great exultation, shoots at the Partisan nurse who was helping a wounded comrade (and kills her), and the second one is when a Chetnik slaughters a wounded Partisan.
"The image of the Chetniks in partisan films was in most cases black and white, with some gray tones," sociologist Nemanja Zvijer, author of the book, told Vreme. Ideology of the film image: "Besides the fact that they are present in almost all films and that in them they have a very enviable 'minute' (only in the film Igman march they appear very briefly in only one scene), for Chetniks is also a characteristic and extremely farcical representation because they were most often depicted as some kind of bearded ghosts. A partial exception to this rule can be found in Goats, where a Chetnik (played by Miloš Kandić), with a relatively normal appearance (short beard and royal army uniform), is captured by the partisans and soon released, and despite his promise, he beats them to the Germans. This naivety of the partisans was probably supposed to show that the Chetniks, among other things, are also liars, which in a wider context called their moral credibility into question."
According to the historian Predrag J. Marković, the Chetniks were on duty enemies in the film, more often than the Ustasha, because the portrayal of the Ustasha led to a delicate questioning of inter-ethnic relations: "The first film in which the Ustasha massacre was shown was Occupation in 26 pictures Lordan Zafranović from 1978. Believe it or not, until then no Ustasha massacre had been shown in any domestic film, because that would have problematized relations between Serbs and Croats." Marković believes that the best picture of the relationship between Partisans and Chetniks is given in the film Deaf gunpowder: "That film was based on the novel by Branko Ćopić, and ironically, it was shot at the very end of that country, in 1990," he says.
ERROR ON THE DROP: Although the Chetniks in Yugoslav film production were mostly portrayed as unrepentant villains, in some places there are partial deviations. "One of those tones can be noticed in the film as well." Republic of Užice Žike Mitrović from 1976, and it refers to Major Barca," says Nemanja Zvijer. The character of Costa Barca is played by Rade Šerbedži. This major of the royal army, who in all aspects deviates from the classic film representation of Chetniks. First of all, its appearance itself is different because it looks sleek, clean-shaven and measured. In addition, it is explicitly emphasized that he is educated, and his high moral views can be seen in the scenes when he watches with amazement and almost disdain the rampage of drunken Chetniks, as well as when he saves a young man from a court-martial who mistakenly had a pentacle on his cap. There is also a strong anti-German orientation in this character, which is most explicitly expressed when showing his conversation with Draž Mihailović, played by Miodrag Lazarević, who hesitates to start fighting against the German despite the persistent urging and insistence of Major Barca.
"The introduction of this character into the collective film portrait of the Chetniks is perhaps more of an aspiration for a more objective portrayal of the Chetnik enemy, because at the beginning of the war the Chetniks were anti-fascist oriented, rather than an attempt at a broader anti-fascismization of this movement," says Zvijer: "In socialist Yugoslavia, the Party had a monopoly to anti-fascism and there could be no compromises. Likewise, we should not forget the official party directive, according to which the priority was to deal with nationalism primarily within its own ranks. Both Bulajić and Mitrović incorporated this directive into their films."
When it comes to the difference in the depiction of Chetniks in Bulajić's and Mitrović's films, Zvijer believes that the difference is not drastic: "In Bulajić's, all Chetniks are generally bad and openly cooperate with the German occupier, but not so much attention is paid to the details." With Mitrović, you have a certain nuance, embodied above all in the character of Major Barca, whose priority is the fight against the Wehrmacht, but that's why in the film itself there is also a much more detailed depiction of Chetnik savagery, like when they cut off the head with a saw."
"AT Republic of Užice approach to the Chetniks is somewhat milder because the authors could not ignore the fact that it was a joint action between the Chetniks and the partisans, because the civil war only started on November 1, 1941. On the other hand, they had to make a film in accordance with the dominant monopolization of the resistance movement." , says Predrag J. Marković.
THE FLOWERS ON MY GARDEN ARE SHAKING: The figure of Draža Mihailović u Republic of Užice is also one of the more important in this film, especially if you look at its dialogue level. Namely, at a meeting of Chetnik leaders, Mihailović openly attacks parliamentarism and democracy, saying that this is why the kingdom collapsed and that it helped the rise of communist ideology. "In this way, positive connotations were indirectly built around the communist ideology because it was emphasized that parliamentarism and democracy are actually preconditions for communism, while Draža Mihailović himself was portrayed as an enemy of parliamentarism (which he formally was not, because he militarily represented the multi-party government in London) ", points out the Beast. In addition to this, the same character in the film emphasizes that the communist ideology is "more dangerous than the occupier himself", which indirectly shows that the Chetniks' fight against the Germans was not a primary concern.
This attitude is confirmed by the scene in which the Chetnik politician explicitly emphasizes that the main program of the Chetniks is in fact "the program of the fight against the communists". In the rest of the film, there are scenes in which other Chetnik politicians emphasize the basic postulates of their ideology, such as the introduction of a "Chetnik dictatorship", then placing the state and the press in the hands of the Chetniks (it is emphasized that the press is free, but within the framework of the Chetnik ideology), as and the creation of an ethnically pure greater Serbia in the greater Yugoslavia. All these statements in themselves represented a criticism of the Chetniks, because as such they were in deep contrast with the official communist ideology. "Besides this indirect shaping of the image of the Chetnik enemy, it is expressed much more directly (that is, more negatively) through a classic visual construction (classic, at least as far as partisan films are concerned). U Republic of Užice this type of presentation implied two forms, one of which was extremely caricature, while the other was - horrifying." Apart from appearance, this category could also include the behavior in the scenes of Chetnik revelry in the tavern, when the drunks go wild with the songs "drma we are shaking, my flowers are shaking, we will kill, we will slaughter whoever does not want to be the king" and "from Topola, from Topola...". In addition to this, the scene in which the driving camera captures a column of Chetniks going into battle to the music of trumpeters with brandy bottles and skewers on their shoulders is also indicative. Apart from caricature, the image of the Chetniks was also characterized by a considerable amount of brutality, which was especially shown in scenes where they kill people in the most brutal ways (beheadings, rape, torture, killing children, slaughter, burning, hanging).
Chetnik brutality is clearly emphasized in The fall of Italy Lordan Zafranović (1981) in scenes where they team up with Circassians who explain to them how they raped a partisan woman and a partisan man, showing their severed heads, all with sick laughter and shouting. The Chetniks continue the bloody feast by slaughtering the child they had previously taken with them to show them the right way. In addition to this, there is also a scene in which a young partisan informs the commander that the Chetniks have slaughtered the entire village and all the children in it. In this film, the clearly shown brutality of the Chetnik enemy is supplemented, as in previous cases, with an extremely caricatured appearance. This is particularly evident in the scene where they sail to the shore on a raft, in which they appear to be figures draped in animal skins, accompanied by eerie music (composed by Alfie Caballo).
HELL'S ANGELS ON THE PAPER: The interlocutors of "Vremen" agree that the visual conceptualization of the Chetniks is particularly prominent in the films Battle of the Neretva i Republic of Užice, significantly shaped their post-communist image. When it comes to the visual identity of the Chetniks, established mainly through Bulajić's films, Predrag J. Marković believes that it is not inauthentic: "The Chetniks had a serious problem with the visual part of their image even during the war, which can be seen in the photographs from that time." They look like a gang of country bandits on a teferič. On the other hand, the partisan image is very modern, because their propaganda is led by Georges Skrygin. When you see women from the Chetnik movement in photographs, they look like crows, while this is not the case with Partisan women. First, Serbs from Bosnia, and then others, in the 90s accepted that image that didn't look good even in the 40s, let alone in the 90s," says Marković and adds: "It's that bizarre, pirate, infantile identification with bad guys. That look is a combination of a Hell's Angel and a Balkan bandit from the 19th century."
"The revival of Chetnik iconography in the early nineties was strongly influenced by their caricatured communist criticism," says Nemanja Zvijer. Explanations for such an unusual development of circumstances can be found, among other things, in the propaganda influence of partisan films, which led to the fact that during the revitalization of the Chetnik movement, the physical expression of the new Chetniks practically coincides with the image broadcast by the mentioned films. also suggests the strength of the image of the Chetniks that was constructed in the mentioned films. Zvijer believes that in the 1990s Chetnik sympathizers hastily incorporated this image into their ideological identity, creating a kind of "instant image": "The non-Chetniks built their identity on their own caricature and criticism. Perhaps this has partly to do with the postmodern impermanence of identity, because after the collapse of socialist Yugoslavia and the dominant ideology, a kind of identity vacuum appeared. In order to overcome this situation, it was necessary to fill the resulting identity gap as soon as possible, so without deep consideration and hastily tailored, conditionally speaking, the 'Chetnik instant image'. In addition, the propaganda influence of partisan films should not be excluded, as well as the highly suggestive power of the image of the Chetniks that was constructed in them."
TV HISTORY: When it comes to film and television dramatizations of historical events, it is impossible to ignore the four-part TV series. The last act Sava Mrmka, based on the script of Sinisa Pavić and Milovan Pejanović, which dealt with the capture of Draža Mihailović and the subsequent trial. Milan Puzić played Draža, and Nikola Kalabić was played by Zoran Rankić. Screenwriter Pavić recently said that the role of Kalabić was perhaps more impressive because it was textually very grateful: "Originally, Kalabić was supposed to be played by Bata Živojinović, so he was injured during the filming of a movie and could not ride a horse, which was foreseen by this role , then everything fell on Dragomir Bojanić Gidra, who had some kind of excess during the filming that could not be tolerated, and then Rankić came in as a third solution, which showed that the director Sava Mrmak made a complete hit." In the same interview, Pavić pointed out that Milan Puzić had a very ungrateful role playing Draža Mihailović: "Draža in that drama is a persecuted man who has lost his historical game and is a target of the work of the intelligence service."
U The last act the minutes from Mihailović's trial were used, so Pavić recently emphasized that in the series he said everything that the real Draža said and nothing was kept silent: "That's why I'm surprised that it's being said that things that have been hushed up until now are only now being revealed."
"Popular culture is often the scene of ideological battles. Partisan films are still shown and watched, and the country and the ideological system within which they were created have not existed for more than 20 years," says Nemanja Zvijer, noting that this can certainly suggest that they were not just ideological propaganda, but also that they also had some other qualities: "However, the currently prevailing ideological pattern calls for a different picture. Revision of the role of the Chetniks is a process that is mostly complete, but popular culture, i.e. film as perhaps its most important factor, is an area in which the aforementioned revision did not gain major momentum, precisely because of the dominance of partisan films. In that sense, the series Flat mountain represents an attempt to change that state in popular culture and harmonize it with the one that is characteristic of society itself. That's why it shouldn't be too much of a surprise if a film wave of idealization and mythologizing of the Chetniks would arise on its wings."
According to data from Imdb.com, Dragoljub Mihailović was played by six actors:
Nebojsa Glogovac, TV series Flat mountain, 2013, Radoš Bajić
Milan Puzić, TV series The last act, 1982, Sava Mrmak
Miodrag Lazarevic, movie Republic of Užice, 1976, Zika Mitrović
Rade Markovic, movie General's cap, 1971, Miomir Stamenković
Vjekoslav Afric, movie In the mountains of Yugoslavia, 1946, Abram Room, Eduard Tisse
philip dorn, movie Chetniks - The Fighting Guerillas, 1943, Lois King
Probably the most famous Yugoslav comic, Never a slave, with its heroes Mirko and Slavko, conspicuously omits the Chetniks from the list of enemies. The reason for this is anyone's guess. Desimir Žižović Buin, the author of the comic strip, was a member of the Chetnik movement until 1943, and later joined the partisans, so the reasons can perhaps be sought on that side. Moreover, Buin was an illustrator for the magazines "Ravnogorski borac" and "Mladi Ravnogorac", edited by Dragiša Vasić.
When it comes to Draža Mihailović as a comic book hero, history records that on April 1, 1993, an issue of the comic book was published in "Pogled" from Kragujevac General Draža. The script was written by Miodrag Milanović, and the illustrations by Stevo Maslek. This episode is called The April War and the plot of the comic mostly revolves around that event. Draža Mihailović is presented with his famous glasses, only with a moustache, with a worried and slightly tired expression on his face.
During the German occupation, Serbian cities were plastered with propaganda posters on which caricatures of Josip Broz Tito and Draža Mihailović (together or as a couple) appeared, depicting them as renegades from the occupation authorities. Most of these (commissioned) drawings were created by local authors.
It is interesting that the album Morgan, the last comic created before his death in 1995 by one of Europe's most famous cartoonists, Hugo Pratt, tells the story of a British lieutenant who wanders the Adriatic coast during the chaos of World War II. Hairy Chetniks were on the way of this allied officer, and the goal of his mission was to help Tito's partisans.
Milan Đoković, the long-time editor of the regional newspaper "Čačanski glas" tried on several occasions to find out the origin of the song "Sa Ovčara i Kablara", so he wrote that although it most resembles a real, folk, refined and expanded song considering the circumstances, maybe a folk singer is standing behind her. He strengthened his belief when, in the early sixties of the last century, retired agricultural technician Momir Pantelić from the Dragačevo village Dučalovići contacted him with the claim that he, as he said, sang and composed the song "Sa Ovčara i Kablara". Đoković wrote: "Pantelic's biography is simple, he was born in 1904, he was known in the village as a good singer and a very literate guy, and already in 1916 he 'sang' his first songs, among them this shepherd's song, which quickly crossed borders villages, municipalities, regions... The verses were as follows:
From Ovčar and Kablar
the shepherdess speaks:
that I'm a chick, or a dove
to fly to Ljubić
to see my Milo
how he parades with the army;
that I am a dove,
to fly to Užice
to see my darling
did he like severe wounds..."
That the song was sung by Momir Pantelić, that it was composed during the First World War and had its own evolutionary path, was also claimed by the famous Čačan poet Branko V. Radičević, who notes that this is a "frame" song into which new words and names were inserted over time and places. Branko V. Radičević recorded some details of his meetings and conversations with Momir Pantelić. The latter explained to him: "I read Njegoš for a long time and a lot, and what is Lovćen for Njegoš, is Ovčar for me." I wrote, corresponded, and wanted to combine Ovčar, Kablar, Ljubić and Užice... my Dučalovići are somehow in the middle..."
Branko V. Radičević wrote (recorded in several issues of the Proceedings of the Čača National Museum) that the song "Sa Ovčara i Kablar" was sung among the Chetniks of the Čača region and that it had these verses:
"From Ovčar and Kablar."
Beautiful Mara speaks
No fight, no war
Without Raković - the commander..."
The lyrics clearly state that this version, and the majority of researchers of the origin of the song agree, is dedicated to Predrag Raković, commander of the Second Ravnagorsk Chetnik Corps, who died on December 25, 1944 in the village of Miokovci. They say the song was sung briefly, because already at the end of 1941, with the "birth of the Užice Republic", the singers gave the song new content:
"From Ovčar and Kablar."
the shepherdess speaks
Comrade Tito, white-faced
when will you get to Užice..."
There has been a heated debate on the Internet for a long time whether the song "Anica Kninska kraljica" by the Croatian right-wing singer Marko Perković Thompson, who became famous for performing pro-Ustasha numbers, is no less than a copy of the Chetnik song "Nad Kraljevo ziva vatra seva". "Anica the Queen of Knin" was recorded in 1995, on Thompson's album Scorpio time, and "Nad Kraljevo ziva vatra seva" is a Chetnik song sung in honor of Chetnik captain Jovan Derok, who was killed on November 6, 1941, in a Chetnik attack on the Republic of Užice.
