Tackling Taboos: Reviewing Srdjan Spasojevic’s Cult Monster, ‘A Serbian Film’

Note: This film is banned in many countries and contains explicit material that will upset some viewers.

“A Serbian Film” is heralded as the ace of exploitation films, lauded as “art” or dammed as filth. Yet neither is true. I say this as a horror connoisseur who’s seen most everything, from “Saw” to “Hostel” to “Terrifier.” Average folks looking for a film to make them scared, excited, afraid, etc. should probably not watch this. It’s banned in many countries; but the version I saw—the uncut version—did not compete with “Hostel: Part 2” or “Terrifier” in terms of brutality or gore. It shatters taboos, but so does the French film “Haute Tension” and “Terrifier 3.” And ironically, most of the film’s notoriety comes from gaining popular in the wrong circles. It’s not about torture or gore, but a wounded national identity. Its word-of-mouth and advanced billing have been its Achilles heel. Viewing it from a “horror” lens—as a genre film daring to be seen—is what’s led to its cult status in the first place.

What’s odd about “A Serbian Film”—directed with small motes of vision by Srdjan Spasojevic—is its slow first half that crashes into a series of shocks intended to answer for its lack of exposition. But the film is not only shock-filled exploitation. It’s clear Spasojevic has something to say. By the film’s 30-minute mark we have some idea what that is, but later—as its protagonist is dragged through the mud, it spirals. Yet I can’t really blame Spasojevic. He’s made an admittedly anti-Milošević-era government film (the protagonist’s name is Milos), and the sickos that have gravitated towards it since its release have elevated it to something else. The film is many things, yet an endurance test is not one of them.

The Edgelord Movie of All Time?

I’m going through all this because I feel the film needs a proper review. The Internet—obsessed with “A Serbian Film’s” terse, taboo-breaking finale—forgets to look at Spasojevic’s work as a movie rather than a monster. The plot is often spastic and fever-dream-like, but not thin. The film wants to be a twisted journey playing with the audience’s emotions through score and atmosphere, and in that it does succeed. It follows retired porn star, Milos (Srdjan Todorovic), trying to focus on his family and leave his past behind.

It’s fitting that American viewers will likely know nothing of Serbia’s porn culture. It helps immerse you into the proceedings. Milos doesn’t look like a porn actor. But do we really even know what that looks like? His wife is loving (a great Jelena Gavrilovic) and his young son, Petar (missing from the cast list) is inquisitive. Other reviews have criticized the nature of the film’s beginning, depicting Petar watching one of Milos’ porn films casually. His mom shoos him away, but it’s not an emergency. Later his father will answer his burgeoning questions about sex maturely and curiously.

Different cultures react to things differently. Yet there’s nothing untoward about Spasojevic’s treatment here. In fact, nearly 40 mins in, you could almost see an entirely different film being made. Milos’ wife is curious if he misses the porn industry. She’s not jealous of all the women he’s had. Milos doesn’t miss the work but misses the money. The couple has to pay for their son’s expensive dance lessons and are short on funds. Here an ex-co-worker, Lejla (Katarina Zutic) entices Milos with a one-last-job scenario even his wife supports. What harm can come from porn after all?

Spasojevic Takes Things to the Extreme

Here, Spasojevic throws in a bunch of elements that work to add atmosphere and foreboding. Milos carries himself with poise and detached arrogance, yet still feels insecure that he can’t financially support his wife. She chose him for love, and given the scenes the two have together (well done, save the film’s desperate ending), it’s almost easy to mistake “A Serbian Film” early on for a nice film. Spasojevic could have spent much less time on the opening family observations and made this a truly and utterly unrepentant gore-fest instead, quick to get to the punch. When he does go for the guts, it’s fast, sudden, and almost feels tacked on (unlike filmmakers like Damien Leone where stomach-turning endurance tests are the point of the film).

If it seems it’s taking a while for me to get to the awful stuff, it’s because the film does. I watched this film with a thick knot in my stomach, waiting for the “sickest film out there,” but walked away feeling like the whole thing had been overhyped. “A Serbian Film’s” early scenes are its best: Milos spending time with his wife and son, and even time with his shady brother, Markos (who lusts for his wife, played well by Slobodan Bestic). And Milos’ relationship with Lejla was interesting. Her wardrobe lets us know she’s still in the business, while Milos’ relaxed, baggy-casual look lets us know he’s not.

A Controversial anti-Milošević-Era Film

However, almost negligently, Spasojevic avoids any passage of judgement on this profession, or on Milos’ lust-filled brother. This is no “Hellraiser,” filled with lust, sex, and forbidden affairs. Marija doesn’t want to have an affair with Markos. She loves her husband. And as Milos returns home each night after his porn shoot—and even as things escalate on-set—the two have tender moments that damage any sense of foreboding Spasojevic and Cinematographer Nemanja Jovanov try and cement during the previous scenes.

What doesn’t help is that the film’s villain, Vukmir (a spastic Sergej Trifunovic) isn’t very believable as one. I don’t know if it’s Trifunovic’s fault or the script; he pontificates about sex and art and porn and how their aim is to allow people who can’t get laid to release their desires from the comfort of their own home. He’s almost a caricature. Are we to later believe he masterminds a pronged drugging of Milos to bend him to his will, abetting the murder of at least one actress in the making of his ‘snuff’ film? I didn’t buy it. Yet here “A Serbian Film” requires context. Spasojevic has explained he is commenting on the country’s history with the Serbian government and “the powers of leaders who hypnotize you to do things you don’t want to do” (here, Vukmir drugs Milos with some rare aphrodisiac, yet I’m sure the point is the Serbian government’s treatment regarding Bosnia and the horrific acts soldiers carried out during that genocide).

Be Warned—it’s Graphic

Readers will want to know what they’re in for or if they should watch this film. I’m not sure it’s my place to make that decision. Being prepared helps. It includes pedophilic inferences and overt child rapes. Yet critics hitherto have failed to cite its extreme anti-woman sentiment in lieu of these aforementioned scenes, which does it a disservice. The more graphic, absurdist scenes in this film I found unbelievable and satirical. But Milos—red-eyed and drugged beyond recognition—beating a woman in one scene—and the way Vukmir and his hired goons want Milos to control and abuse the women—to me were the film’s more hard-to-watch bits.

That’s not to negate the brutality and hedonism of the last act of “A Serbian Film.” I doubt it will ruffle the feathers of many horror connoisseurs. “Saw,” “Hostel: Part 2,” and “I Spit on Your Grave” are much more visually and emotionally disturbing. I still can’t unsee poor Heather Matarazzo’s death from “Hostel: Part 2” and to me “A Serbian Film” never reaches that level. The idea of the scenes—mostly child rape—is worse than the actual scenes. But if you’ve read about the film beforehand, the effect is minimal. The cinematography focuses on Milos’ pained, tortured face and not at the pain being inflicted upon others.

Not About Porn, but a Pained National Identity

Additionally, I feel “A Serbian Film” was not made for gore-hounds, though I agree with the critic who said Spasojevic is trying to comment on torture film lovers—and consumers of pornography in general—who always need to see that next, worst thing. However, parents will likely not do well with this film, nor will impressionable youths not yet wise enough to know this is just a movie. Trigger warning should be issued for victims of rape or intimate partner violence. Yet “A Serbian Film” is not smut. It’s not not smut, either. It’s simply something political and absurdist that Spasojevic felt he had to make and likely applies culturally to a very small audience.

Is “A Serbian Film” the edgelord film to end all edgelord films? I don’t think so. There’s no flaying flesh, there’s no pained, tortured screams, and there is—sadly—a parable and a point. Its notoriety comes not from the director himself as in the case of the “Terrifier” series, but its viewers. It’s not a film about snuff films or murder (see Joel Schumacher’s excellent “8MM” if you want a dark film about that topic), but of war, trauma, and—possibly—fate. It’s not a film I should recommend, but Spasojevic is also not a villain for making it (that would be “Cannibal Holocaust” director Ruggero Deodato, under whom seven animals were killed during production), nor does he endorse—in any way—child rape. Ultimately, globalization does “A Serbian Film” the biggest harm. Without its most viscerally-damaging scenes, I doubt we’d be talking about this film to this degree at all.