neumu [ cinematronic ]




	No Man's Land
	Danis Tanovic Branko Djuric, Rene Bitorajac, Simon Callow, Katrin Cartlidge 2001		You won't find comedy much darker than the painfully hilarious extremes reached in this smart, scathing story of three men in a trench. Set at the height of the recent Bosnian-Serb conflict, "No Man's Land" takes on the futility, idiocy and dehumanizing effects of a genocidal war predicated on ethnic and religious differences. Two bickering soldiers, one from each side, are pinned down in a trench between enemy lines. The situation is complicated by the presence of a third man, who was knocked unconscious and awakes on top of a spring-loaded land mine that will explode if he moves. A U.N. team is sent in to rescue the trio, but various protocols begin undermining the mission. With a multi-national cast that includes British actors Simon Callow as a bureaucratic U.N. commander and Katrin Cartlidge as a weary cable-TV news reporter, the film paints no one in black-and-white terms. The guilt is distributed equally, with the media getting a share. Tears of laughter, frustration and sadness commingle.