Year: 2009

Director: Boris Malagurski

Writer: Boris Malagurski

Music: Filip Borac, Jasna Djuran, Mihaela Istrate

Genre: Documentary

Runtime: 30 min

Language: English, Serbian

The documentary chronicles the stories of Serbs who live in Kosovo without any human rights. Most of the Kosovo Serbs are internally displaced, some of them live in small containter camps, in ghettos, all this in the heart of Europe in the 21st century. Ever since NATO and the UN took control of Kosovo from Belgrade after the bombings in 1999, the local Serbs live in fear and despair, with no one to turn to for help. You will be shocked to learn which atrocities they have to face each and every day.

   2009 | Silver Palm Award | Mexico International Film Festival | Rosarito, Mexico

   2009 | Best Documentary | BC Days Documentary Film Festival | Vancouver, Canada

   2009 | Nomination, Best Documentary | BridgeFest International Film Festival | East Sarajevo, Bosnia & Herzegovina

  2009 | Kosovo Can You Imagine? | Russia Today (RT) | Worldwide (Satellite)

A young man from Subotica, Boris Malagurski, who just recently grew out of his boys’ trousers, decided to make a movie and show it to the world. While the arrogant big names of the Serbian film industry, professional experts in moving pictures, who are admired by the world when they spit on their own people, remained completely deaf, blind and pleasently immune to all those troubles of a lost Kosovo and the few spiteous Serbs left within it, this young man, with boyish innocence, clearly and defiantly went to this “new” Kosovo, hidden behind a foreign passport and with the help of several important foreigners, filmed scenes of Serbs who are suffering and the factual situation in the newborn Albanian democracy, for which we were bombed ten years earlier. His half-hour documentary is a moving record of the gruesom everyday life the leftover Serbs live in Kosovo, literally trapped in their demolished homes, on deserted farms or, even worse, in miserable container camps, makeshift “temporary” solutions and surrounded by barbed wire.

The question raised by the film is contained in the title – “can you imagine?”, which is the only one that can cover these horrific scenes that shock all who encounter them. Who is this question asmed at? All of us, of course. But mainly to those who had decided that the old, abandoned, tortured and in every way humiliated must cry in front of cameras, hiding their tears from the caring Albanian neighbours who proudly burst into their homes to check what the Serbs dare say in front of cameras. Is this, really, posible in the new millenium, the young author asks himself – his words far deeper, more experienced and wiser than his years would suggest – at the beginnig of the film. He continues to show horrific scenes captured by his camera which, shaped into a film, have, in the past months, become a hit around the world, on the Internet, but also in the diaspora and some festivals, such as the BC Days Film Festival in Vancouver, Canada, where it won Best Film.

Malagurski made the film when he was only 19, but he is far from youthful ignorance, superficiality or being uninformed. In 30 minutes, the viewer also learns the historical context of the Kosovo tragedy and very understandable historical and political reasons why Kosovo is the heart of Serbia and why it can never spill into another country. In the film, Boris presented facts from recent history as well, the ones before and after the bombing of Yugoslavia in 1999. He explains the past and present demografics of this land and why it has changed in a certain way. An objective and true journalistic approach, as well as brave field work, make this documentary one that could be envied by any filmmaker.

Vladislav Panov | Pecat Magazine