Written by Jesus Figueroa
@ThisFunktional of ThisFunktional.com
The short clip “Tell Them” from “Dara of Jasenovac,” the Serbian Oscar submission, may not have much context but the intensity is seen through the wonderful acting, camera composition, and sound.
Even having to read subtitles, the tone of voices from the actors sets the mood.
“DARA OF JASENOVAC” is the first-ever feature film about Jasenovac. Shockingly, it is largely unknown as part of that era’s history, though thousands of Serbs, Jews and Roma people, including many children, were murdered within the complex. Jasenovac was the only operational death camp during World War II not created or run by Germans, and one of the most brutal Holocaust-era concentration camps to have ever existed.
In 1940s Croatia, 10-year-old Dara (Biljana Čekić) comes face-to-face with the horrors of the Holocaust era after she is sent with her mother and siblings to the concentration camp complex known as Jasenovac. Overseen by vicious emissaries of the fascist Ustase government, the facility, the only operational death camp during World War II not created or run by the Germans, is tasked with murdering Serbs, Jews and Roma people—and re-educating the few children deemed worthy of rehabilitation. As unspeakable atrocities unfold all around her, young Dara must summon tremendous courage to protect her infant brother from a terrible fate, to safeguard her own survival and to plot a precarious path toward freedom.
The film is executive produced by writer, professor and historical consultant Dr. Michael Berenbaum, who is the director of the Sigi Ziering Institute at the American Jewish University, where he is also a professor of Jewish Studies, and he has served as consultant for more than two dozen films in multiple languages throughout the world, several of which have won Emmys and Academy Awards (ONE SURVIVOR REMEMBERS, LAST DAYS).
DARA OF JASENOVAC
Will Have A Limited Release On February 5
