“They can’t touch the UN.” Local Bosnian resident and United Nations translator Aida (Jasna Đuričić)’s firm belief in the organization’s ability to protect the people of Srebrenica is shattered over the course of writer-director Jasmila Žbanic’s latest gripping feature, Quo Vadis Aida?
Set in and around the small town of Srebrenica near the end of the Bosnian War (1992-1995), Žbanic’s film depicts the July 1995 Srebrenica massacre of over 8000 residents, mostly Muslim men and boys, by Bosnian Serbs under the command of General Ratko Mladić. The Serbian army overran the town, which had been designated a “safe zone” under UN protection during the war. Residents fled to the nearby UN base seeking shelter. A seemingly enormous undertaking for a film, Žbanic finds her focus through the lens of the fictional character Aida, a Bosnian teacher working as a translator for the UN who resolves to protect her family.
From the film’s opening shots, everyone looks to Aida for help: her husband and two adult sons, the Srebrenica townspeople, and the UN peacekeeping troops. Aida’s initial trust in the UN’s commitment to protect them all erodes throughout the film, and she finds herself caught between her duties to the UN and her determination to save her family. Aida’s wavering belief in her own role is highlighted when a neighbour turns to her in search of answers and Aida insists, “I’m just an interpreter.” The neighbour replies, “But you’re with them.” It’s an uncomfortable distinction, one that Aida is increasingly conflicted about as her frustration at the Dutch UN peacekeepers intensifies and she becomes unwillingly complicit in spreading their false reassurances of safety to her people; and yet, Aida must continue to rely on her ‘privileged’ position as a UN employee in hopes of leveraging some protection for her husband and sons.
At times heartfelt, heartbreaking and infuriating, Žbanic relentlessly drives us forward alongside Aida as she hurries through the crowded halls of the UN base in search of solutions. Moments in which we can pause to catch our breath and take temporary respite from the looming threat are few and far between—and all the more precious as a result. Taking advantage of a brief lull, Aida and a UN doctor share a smoke and float ideas about what they’ll each do after the war. Reunited inside the base, Aida and her family find moments of rare quiet when everyone else is sleeping to simply be together. And a flashback to a joyful town celebration shows familiar faces in happier times, although the scene soon gives way to the ominous, hinting at the impending despair when a circle of dancing townspeople make their way across a static frame. Each dancer in turn stares stoically into the camera, an unsettling contradiction to their movement, like they already know they’re linked hand-in-hand and by the shared tragedy to come.
Quo Vadis Aida? does an excellent job relaying necessary historical context to viewers without relying on exposition. Žbanic expected a viewership with mixed previous knowledge about the Srebrenica massacre and prepared for it. She expertly condenses the events and provides the contextual framework to viewers without alerting us to the fact she’s doing it, such is her command of the narrative. Meanwhile, viewers familiar with the history will pick up on Žbanic’s inclusion of certain pieces of dialogue and cinematography choices that mirror actual footage of General Mladić entering the emptied streets of Srebrenica.
Our shock at the improbably vast quantity of Srebrenica refugees crowding the field outside the gates of the UN base is only surpassed by how quickly that crowd disappears amid dizzying sweeps of forced ‘evacuations’ conducted by the Bosnian Serbs right in front of the UN base. The field is made barren once more. Lives are simply erased. In another scene, fearful for their lives, Aida hurriedly tears family photographs apart, destroying evidence of her family’s very existence in an effort to protect them.
Jasna Đuričić leads a fantastic cast, capturing Aida’s emotional shifts and resilience with a grim honesty as she navigates through the labyrinth of what Žbanic describes as the “male game of war,” in which “responsibility is always with the authority somewhere else.” We see this in the notable renderings of Dutch UN battalion members Colonel Karremans and Major Franken, played by Johan Heldenbergh and Raymond Thiry, respectively. At times, these characters invite us to share in their own frustration at their failings; Karremans’ repeated phone calls to the UN to request aid are studiously ignored, and in one memorable instance of fury he demands to know how the entire UN chain of command can be on vacation. However, the UN troops’ lack of empathy and foresight, their insistence on upholding bureaucracy, and their deferral of responsibility while violence unfolds outside their gates has striking consequences.
Jasmila Žbanic’s Quo Vadis Aida? has garnered international attention and received an Academy Award nomination for Best International Feature Film. A commanding filmmaker with a solid grasp of her subjects, Quo Vadis, Aida? marks Žbanic’s seventh film. Her feature debut, Grbavica: Land of My Dreams won the 2006 Berlinale Golden Bear, and in 2014 Žbanic was awarded the KAIROS prize recognizing the cultural and social impact of her work. Seven years later, Žbanic continues to dig deeper into the consequences of war and the systems that perpetuate it, leaving the burden of intergenerational trauma and a barren field in its destructive wake.
Score: A
© 2021. UniversalCinema Mag.