Section: Feature Film Competition

GLAVA VELIKE RIBE

The Head Of A Big Fish

Arsen Oremović
HR, 2022, 80 Min

"Tractor", the war veteran from Slavonia, could almost be a brother of Travis from Wim Wenders’ "Paris-Texas". He hardly speaks, no longer shaves and needs a push from his brother from Zagreb to at least communicate something again in this calmly staged film about two brothers in post-Yugoslav Croatia which, with its powerful imagery and outstanding cast, speaks of a land in transition, even if its protagonists imagined that things would turn out differently.

He lives in the village, barely says a word, seems embittered and not particularly enamoured with life. He does constantly clean his machine gun though. And just when you think that this bearded hermit is about to end his life, up shows his effervescent brother from Zagreb together with his wife. The old house in which Tractor, as everyone calls him, vegetates rather than lives, is to be sold. Tractor can flourish in the big city of Zagreb. The only problem is that his brother, the "businessman", doesn't know much about business. And thus, the petty-bourgeois idyll of "brother with wife and brother in the big city" quickly starts to come apart. Stylistically the imagery of director Arsen Oremović, who has hitherto made a name for himself with his documentaries, is at times reminiscent of the works of the Dardenne brothers, augmented with poetic still lifes.

Text: Jörg Taszman

English: Peter Rickerby

Stadthalle: Original version with English subtitles + German simultaneous translation.

Weltspiegel Saal 2: Original version with English subtitles

Drehbuch
Arsen Oremović
Kamera
Marinko Marinkić
Ton
Tihomir Vrbanec
Schnitt
Tomislav Pavlic
Ausstattung
Dino Topolnjak
Musik
Toni Starešinić
Darsteller
Lana Barić, Nikša Butijer
Produzent
Katarina Prpić
Produktion
Izazov 365
Arsen Oremović

Arsen Oremović - Arsen Oremović (1966), graduated from
film and TV direction at the Academy of Dramatic Arts in Zagreb. He worked as a film critic and the editor of the daily Večernji list for years, and since 2017 he has dedicated his work primarily to film and TV direction. He directed the awarded documentaries Married to the Swiss Franc (2013), The Castle Crash (2014), Third Best (2016), That’s The Way It Is (2018), short film Life is Fair (2015) and three seasons of documentary TV series Disaster (2018,2020, 2022). The Head of a Big Fish is his debut feature.