Goran (SXSW 2017)
Starring Franjo Dijak, Natasa Janjic, Janko Popovic Volaric
Directed by Nevio Marasovic
With its initial screening having passed at SXSW 2017, Nevio Marasovic’s dark feature Goran throws the audience into a downward spiral of a man’s life when he find out that a potentially happy occurrence isn’t exactly as such.
Blending equal doses of thriller, dark comedy and dramatic elements, the film uses all three to gloomily paint a picture that will pull you along very slowly at first, then begin to drag you unmercilessly throughout its final acts. Goran (Dijak) is a man making a modest living as a taxi driver in the snowy region of Gorski Kotar, and his salvation in life is his beautiful wife (Janjic), who is also blind. His care for her is something that drives him, and with the recently dropped news that she is pregnant, his existence just got a whole lot more meaningful…uh, that is until the REAL news comes to pass. I’ll keep these details under wraps, simply due to the fact that it should be checked out by your eyes, not mine, and it’s pretty damned entertaining to boot. So, Goran and his wife, flocked by some close pals, all head to a remote cabin in the snow-blasted mountains, complete with freshly-constructed sauna to commemorate the blessed announcement and blow off a little steam. At this point, Goran begins to have some serious doubts about all of the relationships he’s committed to (wife, friends, job), and we the audience begin to see this delicate tapestry of emotions begin to fray beyond repair, and what happens will shock and awe, that’s for sure.
I’m just going to throw this one out there and hopefully it will stick to the wall – the film is held high above the waterline by Dijak’s performance as the mentally worn-out soul who finds his life taking a serious swirl down the porcelain. His expressionless gaze in more than one instance implies his unwillingness to overreact to the situation at hand, and represents a person who is simply lost in a sea of emotion – classic stuff right here. What unfortunately brings the film to a halt is the way it’s paced, with an extremely sluggish build-up, then a swerve completely out of left field towards the close, and it adds up to one of those “what the hell just happened?” moments. It doesn’t waste the films progression, but it does hinder its movement towards utter believability. Also, aside from constructing a character so strongly as Goran, we’re left with empty shells all around him with the development of his wife and friends, and while it might have come with good reason, a little more framing around their ways and meanings could have brought the story full-circle. Overall, Goran isn’t a bad film to jump into for around 90-minutes – now would it be my first choice? No, but if you’re looking for a cautionary tale that would make anyone look for red flags around their inner circle, this would be it.
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Film
Categorized:Reviews
