When Father Was Away on Business
| When Father Was Away on Business | |
|---|---|
| File:WhenFather.jpg | |
| Directed by | Emir Kusturica |
| Produced by | Mirza Pašić |
| Written by | Abdulah Sidran |
| Starring | Moreno De Bartolli Miki Manojlović Mirjana Karanović Mustafa Nadarević Mira Furlan Davor Dujmović Predrag Laković Pavle Vujisić |
| Music by | Zoran Simjanović |
| Cinematography | Vilko Filač |
| Edited by | Andrija Zafranović |
|
Production
company |
|
| Distributed by | Scotia International Filmverleih (1985) (West Germany) Cannon Film Distributors (USA) (subtitled) Hollydan Works (2007-2008) (Non-US) Koch Lorber Films (2005) (USA) |
|
Release dates
|
<templatestyles src="Plainlist/styles.css"/>
|
|
Running time
|
136 minutes |
| Country | Yugoslavia |
| Language | Serbo-Croatian |
| Box office | $25,053 (West Germany only) $16,131 (USA only) |
When Father Was Away on Business (Serbo-Croat: Otac na službenom putu, Отац на службеном путу) is a 1985 Yugoslav film by Serbian director Emir Kusturica. The screenplay was written by the Bosnian dramatist Abdulah Sidran. Its subtitle is A Historical Love Film and it was produced by Centar Film and Forum, production companies based in Sarajevo.
Set in post-World War II Yugoslavia during the Informbiro period, the film tells the story through the eyes of the young boy Malik. His father, communist functionary Meša (played by Miki Manojlović), has been sent to a labour camp by his own brother-in-law (his wife Sena's brother) Zijo who's an even higher positioned communist functionary for making a remark about a political cartoon in the Politika newspaper.
Plot
The movie opens in June 1950 with a local neighbourhood drunk Čika Franjo serenading field workers. He sings Mexican songs (as it turns out, he does so out of self-preservation, figuring it's safer for him to steer clear of songs originating from either of the two dominant global powers — U.S.A. and U.S.S.R. — in the current climate of Cold War and Yugoslavia's paranoid repressive internal apparatus looking to identify and remove enemies of the state in the wake of the Tito-Stalin split) while local children, including Malik, climb trees and play around. The story is from the perspective of the boy, Malik, whose mother Sena tells him that his father is on a business trip. Malik is a chronic sleepwalker.
After a while, Meša's wife and children rejoin him in Zvornik. Malik meets Maša, the daughter of a Russian doctor. He falls in love with her, but last sees her when the ambulance takes her away.
At the wedding of his maternal uncle Fahro, Malik witnesses his father's affair with a woman pilot. She later tries to commit suicide by using a toilet's flush cord. Sena reconciles with her brother Zijah, who's been diagnosed with diabetes.
Cast
- Moreno De Bartolli as Malik Malkoč
- Miki Manojlović as Mehmed "Meša" Malkoč
- Mirjana Karanović as Senija "Sena" Malkoč (née Zulfikarpašić)
- Mira Furlan as Ankica Vidmar
- Mustafa Nadarević as Zijah "Zijo" Zulfikarpašić
- Predrag Laković as Franjo
- Pavle Vujisić as Muzafer Zulfikarpašić
- Slobodan Aligrudić as Ostoja Cekić
- Aleksandar Dorčev as Dr. Evgeni Liakhov
- Silvija Puharić as Masha Liakhov
- Emir Hadžihafizbegović as Fahro Zulfikarpašić
- Davor Dujmović as Mirza Malkoč
- Eva Ras as Ilonka Petrović
- Jelena Čović as Nataša Petrović
- Amer Kapetanović as Serjoža Petrović
- Zoran Radmilović as Brko Pilot
- Tomislav Gelić as Hamdo Malkoč, barber
- Zaim Muzaferija as Predsjednik
Awards
- 1985 Cannes Film Festival: the Palme d'Or (Golden Palm) and the FIPRESCI Prize,[1]
- Nominated for the 1985 Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film[2]
See also
- List of Yugoslavian films
- List of submissions to the 58th Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film
- List of Yugoslav submissions for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film
