DAYS OF CROATIAN FILM ’97

Derogatory Reforms of the Days of Croatian Film

The article is a polemic with the changing conceptions of the festival of national films — Days of Croatian Film.

In an endemic reformist spirit, the good initial conception of the Days of Croatian Film as an annual revue of all that had been done in a previous year production of Croatian film, have been undermined by a succession of reforms. The first reform was in abducting the feature film from the Days, in order to preserve a traditional Pula festival as the »national« feature film festival (previously a festival of Yugoslav feature films). The reform caused the loss of public interest in the Days. The second reform undermined the primacy of awards voted by the film critics present at the festival and granted for the best films in different »disciplines« (medium feature, short feature, documentary, animation, experimental film, commercials, music clips).

Since this vote was often quite harsh to the established authors and to the films with politically »valuable topics«, the corrective »official jury« was established to select the »Grand Prix« film and to grant »contribution« awards (for the best director, cinematography, editor, film music...). By this move, the critic vote was pushed to the margin, as one among the other marginal awards. Now, the third reform is being suggested. Since video works and television productions dominate the Days, a suggestion is voiced to turn the Days of Croatian Film into the Days of Croatian Television. The article argues against this possible move, suggesting the establishing of a separate Festival of TV programs, where the existing TV stations would compete with their programs among themselves.

Hrvoje Turković