“ God will not help ” Director on the outsets, religion, sheep

God will not help (God will not help), The second article by the Croatian writer-director Hana Jušić (Stop looking at my plate), is not your typical time piece. Far from it!

“Teresa, a Chilean woman, arrives in a firmly structured mountainous community isolated from Croatian shepherds at the beginning of the 20th century, claiming to be the widow of their emigrant brother”, reads a synopsis for the film, whose casting is led by Manuela Martelli, Ana Marija Veselčić, and Filip đagorić, and also Mauro Ercegović đagić ,, and also has Maregović, and Filip đagoéri Nikša Butijer. “His arrival has a significant impact on the dynamics among the members of the community and brings problems as well as inspiration for other women”, in particular Milena.

The co -production between Croatia, Italy, Romania, Greece, France and Slovenia, had its world premiere at the recent Locarno film festival, where he won Martelli and Veselčić Best Competition Performance Awards. He went to program the 31st edition of the Sarajevo Film Festival competition, where he created an additional buzz.

God will not helpFrom producer Ankica Juric Tilić and a group of co -producers, presents cinematography by Jana Plećaa, edition by Jan Klemsche, Costames of Katarina Pilić, Conception of production
By Laura Boniand and the music of Stavros Evangelou, Iris Asimakopoulou and Vasilis Chontos.

“I wanted to explore what real human solidarity and empathy could mean within the framework of rigid values ​​systems which are based on the feverish desire to belong or have”, according to a note from the director.

At the Sarajevo festival, Jušić spoke to THR to put female characters and religion under the spotlight God will not helpHow the film’s sheep affected his filming schedule and what the author plans to do next.

Stop looking at my plate And God will not help Have different parameters, but they share certain key themes, right?

Yes, part of the voice could be similar. And I think that the similarities are mainly in the characters and the configuration of the characters, because in both, I have female figures which are outsets of their society, the family, and the rest of the people act like a pack of wolves, trying to tear them.

In Stop looking at my plateThe end did not free my character, and it disturbed me for many years that I left this character in a toxic environment. Then in God will not helpI decided to do something different.

You shot God will not help in the mountains. How pleasant and difficult to shoot in nature?

Fortunately, we did not sleep in the mountains. There is a nearby city where we went every night. But it was a bit difficult to shoot, I will not try to decrease it. I really wanted nature to be an important aspect of the film, and I wanted us to be immersed in it. But nature is nature, and a mountain is a mountain. We are only small particles on this large mountain. And sometimes I really felt like we were intruders. You can’t feel that you are an intruder there, with all the cars and all of us there, and you have this beautiful surrounding around us. And I wanted, in the viewing experience, for this nature of engulfing you as a spectator, yes.

It is society and nature, as in westerns, where you have nature, and people who build society, but in fact, this society brings more chaos and violence.

How fast did you know that your protagonist would be a Chilean woman, just like the actress
Manuela Martelli, and why did you want her to be foreign?

I knew it from the start because I saw Manuela in a short film, Valparaiso By Carlo Sironi, and I loved him so much. Croatia also has strong immigration to Chile, so I thought it could be used.

Tell me a little why do you like to present strong female characters?

This element of female rebellion is very important to me. I really wanted not to show that these women have trouble, but also [perform] These small acts of rebellion. I like, for example, that Milena is lazy and that she does not want to do anything in the house, and everyone says that she is so lazy. But this laziness is his little act of rebellion. This is something that I really like. And at the end, I wanted to give them a great rebellion.

Looking at your employees and your team, you also have a solid creative female team behind the camera. How do you know them or how did you find them?

It is very pleasant, because my dop and I, as well as my costume maker and my publisher, who is a man, have worked together since we were students. We have done all the short films together, and Stop looking at my plateAnd now this one. And Ankica, the producer, also produced Stop looking at my plate. We are therefore mainly women and still work together, and we are at the heart of the film.

Tell me a little about the religious aspect of the film. Why is religion one of the key themes? Does that have to do with your home, Croatia?

Croatia now has this very strong far right movement that is developing, and it is very linked to the Catholic Church and religion. The Church is very in politics. Priests often talk about politics. For me, it’s a very big problem there. We had this Croatian Nazi diet. And now this movement is intertwined with the church. It’s frightening.

So, I wanted to approach this false religion in a way which is represented by some of the characters in the film. But I also wanted to approach this spirituality, this more individual and intimate spirituality in the character of Ilija (đurić).

The two main female characters in God will not help Do not speak the same language, so Teresa learns the language of its new environment, which leads to all kinds of interesting scenes. Noam Chomsky and others wrote on the role that language plays in our understanding of the world. Why did you want to pay such attention to this language?

I wanted Teresa to learn words that would help him tell him secret. In addition, this world they live is very simple. You mentioned Chomsky. Their world is their sheep, the mountain and there is the knife – it is all the useful things and objects that surround them. So I wanted her to learn their world through words for very concrete things. The life of the shepherd is very concrete.

Since you mentioned the sheep. How did all the sheep affect your shooting?

When we fired, we would have a catch, and if this socket was not good, we had to make another catch and that we had to put all the sheep in the same position. So people were running after the sheep, trying to put them in the same position for once. So it took us a long time to staging sheep. And we ended up making seven shots a day, instead of the 15 that we had planned. Overall, we turned for 36 days.

The “God will not help” the Sarajevo Film Festival team.

The music of the film is not the music of the shepherds but burning, more industrial. What was that thought behind this?

My editor -in -chief, Jan, who is also a musical editor, and I spoke and I really did not want to have the music typical of the region and the period, like the music of Shepherd. We wanted to add another layer with music, music that highlights emotion. We just wanted to have scenes where music is overwhelming in a way, and our reference was mainly [the band] Tangerine Dream of the 70s.

So we were trying to find someone who makes this kind of music today. And because we are a Greek co-production, we looked for Greek composers. So Jan went on the internet and watched small labels, clubs, and asked everyone in Greece. And then we met Stavros and Iris, and Vasilis, who are the composers. Our collaboration was really perfect. We never saw each other beyond the zoom, but they were incredible.

Do you already have an idea for your next film?

Yeah, because it took me nine years between Stop looking at my plate And this film, I would really like to make another a little faster film. I already have an idea. I would like to make a film on an actress who is a very bad actress and tries really hard. This idea has stayed with me for some time now, and I will try to write it.

Where does this idea come from?

I am always obsessed with the actors because the game is something so connected to you. I mean, we all have jobs, but acting is really that you give your body, your voice, your face, your everything, to do your job. And I have always wondered if the actors who are not good know that they are not good. Do you feel it in your body? Are you going to work every day thinking: “Okay, I was really bad today”? How painful is it? I think the actors are very vulnerable. And this vulnerability is interesting for me

Is there anything else you would like to mention or highlight?

My costume tree told me yesterday God will not help is a costume film, but no one ever mentions the costumes when they write about this film. So I wanted to say that for us, these costumes were extremely important. Especially in Croatia, in all period films, everyone always seems to be in new clothes that came directly from the museum. And I really wanted to make them dirty, so that their costumes are really worn out by time. It was very important for us to obtain this authenticity. By writing the script and preparing the film, I said to myself: “If their costumes seem new, everything will be completely incredible.”

Teresa’s black dress is quite memorable …

This dress was also one of my first reasons for writing the script. It was this woman in a black dress, because I am a big fan of Gothic novels and things like that.