| 首頁 Home | 電影 Films | 評論 Opinions | 戲院 Cinemas | 資訊 Information | 網站地圖 Site Map

首頁 -> 評論 -> 新片評論 ->
Home -> Opinions -> Current Film Reviews ->

The story of "No Man's Land" is about a Bosnian soldier Ciki (Branko Djuric) and a Serbian soldier Nino (Rene Bitorajac) trapped in a trench during the Bosnian War in 1993. Nino was sent to investigate the trench after Ciki's team was attacked and some members of the team fell into it. Nino's captain placed a mine under Cera, another Bosnian soldier, in order to kill other Bosnians when they try to remove the dead bodies. Ciki killed the captain but was determined not to kill Nino. Bound by friendship with Cera, Ciki decided to stay and call for help with the help of Nino. They managed to get the attention of both sides and it was the first time that both sides asked for the same help from UNPROFOR (the peace keeping army from United Nations). What was the fate of the 3 soldiers afterwards?

The film portrayed the ridicule of the Bosnian war. Ciki and Nino actually came basically from the same area and Ciki happened to be an acquaintance of Nino's girlfriend. But now, they had to face each other with the threat of killing in every minute, not because any of them did anything wrong to the other one, but just because they were from different races and were forced to be on different sides. They once decided to make peace with each other, but the fact that they were on different sides inevitably called for a tragic ending.

The languages used in the film also revealed the ridicule of the Bosnian War. Croatians, Serbs, Bosnians, all basically speak the same language, but it was those outsiders who only spoke their own languages who were trying to "help". Given that, Ciki's speaking to Nino when the French soldiers were in the trench was amusing: "Don't translate unless I ask you to."

The story also portrayed a lot about the role of UNPROFOR in the war. While the UNPROFOR soldiers could do and should do more, they were just there, doing not much but to watch the two sides fight. Certainly, there were soldiers like Sergeant Marchand (Georges Siatidis) who wanted to be more than a spectator, but more of them were like Colonel Scott (Simon Callow). The mine placed under Cera, ridiculous enough, was made in E.U., and the soldiers in E.U. were trying to stop the war?!

One thing that interests me is that both Serbian soldiers, Ciki and Cera, were played by Croatians-Croats rather than Bosnian-Serbs. Croatia is a former Yugoslavian state, and it played a role in the Bosnian War. Is it too sensitive to hire Serbs to play the roles? Or are there other reasons behind?

The film fetched the Golden Globe (Best Foreign Film) and Oscar (Best Foreign Language Film). I believe it deserved the awards. This film is my another candidate for the best film shown in Hong Kong in 2002.

註：本評論純屬影評作者個人意見，並不代表本網立場。
Note: This views presented in this review is solely the views of the critic who wrote it and do not represent the stance of our website.

相關連結 Related Links

• 最近公影電影 Recent, Current, and Upcoming Films