Underground | 
| Actors: Hark Bohm, Davor Dujmovic, Mirjana Jokovic, Erol Kadic, Dr. Nele Karajlic
Studio: New Yorker Video
List Price: $14.95
Buy New: $9.58
You Save: $5.37 (36%)
New (3) Used (11) Collectible (1) from $3.48
Rating:  70 reviews
Sales Rank: 12230
Format: Color, Letterboxed, Subtitled, Widescreen, Ntsc
Languages: English (Original Language), French (Original Language), German (Original Language), Serbo-croatian (Original Language)
Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Media: VHS Tape
Number Of Items: 1
Running Time: 167 Minutes
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.4
Dimensions (in): 7.3 x 4.2 x 1.1
ISBN: 1567301592
UPC: 717119640934
EAN: 9781567301595
ASIN: 1567301592
Theatrical Release Date: June 20, 1997
Release Date: May 16, 2000
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: Brand new and factory-sealed. Fast shipping.
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| Editorial Reviews:
Amazon.com
This sprawling, exhausting, deeply moving Palme d'Or winner represents the pinnacle of Serbian director Emir Kusturica's considerable abilities, and what is easily one of the best cinematic achievements of the 1990s. It encapsulates 50 turbulent years of Yugoslavian history, from the outbreak of World War II in the 1940s to the destruction of this once-great nation in the 1990s. When we first meet Marko (Miki Manojlovic) and Blacky (Lazar Ristovski), it's hard to take these jokers seriously. All they want to do is party their lives away. But the Nazi shelling of Belgrade changes everything, and the resourceful duo comes up with an ingenious plan--one will stay aboveground while the other goes underground. The arrangement represents an ideal opportunity for all concerned: Blacky, his wife, and the rest of their friends and neighbors will be protected from the chaos going on above, while Marko and the lovely Natalija (Mira Sorvino look-alike Mirjana Jokovic) will sell the weapons they're making down below. Everyone will share in the profits. But Marko commits the ultimate act of betrayal--against Blacky and the rest of his subterranean comrades. This sort of deception can only lead to tragedy, and Kusturica doesn't spare us the details. In fact, it's his eye for detail that makes Underground such a memorable experience--the perfect note his cast strikes between the extremes of physical comedy, passionate romance, and mortal pain, the insidiously infectious brass-heavy score and the strikingly colorful images. Underground is basically a parable, and doesn't always adhere to the laws of physics. It isn't for the literal-minded, the impatient, or the partisan. It's loud, it's long, and it isn't for the easily offended. It may just also be one of the saddest movies ever made and stands as a fitting tribute to a country that exists only in the hearts and minds of its former residents. --Kathleen C. Fennessy
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| Customer Reviews: Read 65 more reviews...
 A wild, extravagant fable Yugoslavia's history April 29, 2005
Danny M. Hobbs (Tigard, OR United States)
22 out of 23 found this review helpful
As with Kusturica's "Black Cat, White Cat," it's almost impossible to summarize the plot of this film. Suffice it to say that the film is a quasi-realistic fable of perhaps 50 years in the history of Yugoslavia, beginning during WWII. It has everything - love, betrayal, greed, tragedy, comedy - even a touch of magic now and then.
I love the pure extravagance of this film. A tiger, trapped in ruins, reaches for the head of a defiant swan. An elephant steals a pair of shoes from an open, 2nd story window. A young woman flies through the air to her waiting groom - attached or not to a battering ram? Blacky, an electrician, has seemingly infinite resistance (pun intended) to torture by electrical shock - not to mention that he sleeps with his eyes wide open and charges on-stage while his lover is performing, ties her on his back, and carries her away.
And all this is done at the pace of the Marx Brothers on speed and with NO reliance on computer-generated graphics. It's all from the creative brains of the writer/director/cinematographer team. Forget realism - just take a ride on the back of this film and try to catch your breath!
The movie explains why Yugoslavia fell apart May 1, 2005
Boris Malagurski (Vancouver, BC Canada)
18 out of 21 found this review helpful
If you ever wondered why all those wars in Yugoslavia broke out, don't watch documentary films about it, watch this movie. I am originaly from Yugoslavia, and I know how horrible that war was. And why did it brake out? Why did Serbs kill Croats, Croats kill Serbs,...? Why did brothers kill brothers when they all lived together under Tito only 10 years ago? Is Milosevic to blame? No, if the people didn't want to kill each other, they wouldn't have elected him. To find out the reason why it happened, we have to analyze WWII in Yugoslavia a little better. Thats exactly what this movie does. Even if you're not Yugoslavian, you will feel sad at the end of the movie. Yugoslavs are not crazy, war-loving animals, we are just hungry for party's, tuba music and just having fun. After seeing this movie, you will have a new understanding for the Balkans conflict and probably will be very mad when you hear someone say "Yugoslavia fell apart because those Slavs are nuts". I think that Emir Kusturica is a genius, and you will understand why when you see this movie.
Boris, from Vancouver (originaly from SUBOTICA, YU)
A Masterpiece! September 16, 1999
16 out of 18 found this review helpful
Magic, wild, powerful, absurd and disturbing at times. It pulls you in from the opening shot set to the wild score of the gypsy brass band, following guns-wielding, slivovoce-swigging main characters, Blacky and Marko. (A note on the band: The name of the band is "Boban Markovic Brass Orchestra", one pretty difficult to come across. Buy "Jova Stojiljkovic and his brass Orkestar" or as one of the reviewers suggested - "Fanfare Ciocarlia"(Amazon has them both). Band is present almost in every shot, which as a lover of Balkan music, I greatly appreciated. Through the first 2/3 of this epic, its music swirls you through a carnival of masterfully filmed events(weddings, brawls, deaths, fights, escapes, etc) right to the nightmare of the Bosnian war. Then smile is instantly wiped out from your face, as you watch former Yugoslavia burn amd the protagonists anihilate each other. In the final scene all the characters meet and party again on an island, drifting away, for the first time under a broad daylight. As a whole, this film is an uproarious, fast-paced, out-of-control comedy and a powerful testament against stupidity and absurdity of war.
A singular and brilliant film August 4, 2007
Miles Blizard (Austin, Texas)
16 out of 16 found this review helpful
Seldom, if ever have I been so enamored with a movie. Emir Kusturica weaves a poignant, comic, vicious, madcap, sprawling, and physics defying cinematic experience deftly intertwined with the history of Yugoslavia and its successor states.
Most criticism of the film that I have read revolves around the interpretation historical events. I am not Serbian or Bosnian but I do have knowledge concerning the break-up of the Yugoslavia, WWII, and the Serbian atrocities inflicted on various other ethnic groups in the region. Emir Kusturica was so badgered by attacks concerning his glossing over of the real issues of the succession (ethnic cleansing etc..) he was forced into voluntary film retirement (thankfully that did not last long) because of the hostile reaction he received at home in Bosnia even though he won the prestigious Palm de'Or at Cannes in 1995. I do not have a clear rebuttal, but I can say that this exclusion should not condemn him. The monumental task of embodying the history of a country, the feelings of a people, into an extended family over 60 years cannot include everything. A WWII movie about the invasion of Normandy most likely will not address the holocaust, neither will a movie about German U-boat captains address the Invasion of Russia in any depth. The material which he covers for a Hollywood director would be material for 10s of movies. His concentration on a single family (and the history that eddies around them) excludes discussion of atrocities for to quote Emir "they were not all bad."
In his interview at the Cannes Emir made the point that the film was to show that the people in the troubles of Yugoslavia were "not all bad." This statement is depressing in the context of the movie itself for it is hard for the audience to sympathize with anyone. Those that are truly innocent are either mentally retarded or hidden Underground and brainwashed with Tito propaganda. That is the chilling part of the film, and this I feel is the crux of his message. Many people in Yugoslavia were misguided, but in the context of Tito's regime, WWII these actions are definitely not to be forgiven but perhaps, understood in context to a greater degree.
The acting is impeccable. Miki Manojlovic is my personal favorite portraying the alcoholic womanizing and eventually fiercely loyal husband. The chemistry between him and his best friend (Lazar Ristovski) is exceptional as is the love triangle with Mirjana Jokovic (an amazing actress). Slavko Stimac plays the mentally slow Ivan and his journey through the tunnels in search of his chimpanzee friend is harrowing and frightening.
My favorite element of Emir Kusturica's films is his use of magical realism. This element is normally used by South American writers, and Italo Calvino and Borges in Europe but rarely is it used in Cinema. If used poorly it can seem corny and contrived. Emir is the master of using the technique, for example, the glorious Underground wedding scene with the bride connected to the wheeled wooden arm. Only in the beginning is this moving contraption seen, in all other shots the bride is actually flying around the room, over the tables. The effect is stunning. Many stories thrive off of unexplained, unscientific, elements that the characters themselves are oblivious too. The grenade exploding in the suitcase, the detaching island, the underwater scenes, etc...
The movie is LONG. The scenes are madcap, the music exceptional and infectious and inches further and further into your skull as you watch edging you on to some conclusion, either you love or despise the movie. The movie is also heart wrenching while being astoundingly funny, the dichotomy is paramount to his message. It explores the joys of family, of love, and the terror of events and feelings (war, lust) that seem out of and individual's control. A cinematic masterpiece.
A Surreal Comic political masterpiece August 17, 1999
15 out of 22 found this review helpful
I am Croatian and quite familiar with the politics which underly Kusturica's invented History. Despite arguments that the movie is pro-Serb, I feel that this film reaches for the heart of the Serb perception of themselves as well as the world around them. It is an allegorical tale told with such visionary power and magnitude that it exists on its own terms as pure art, regardless of content. The film is worth viewing for the music alone. Frenzied, extravagant, violent and uproarious. I recommend this film to people to understand the visceral levels and dimensions within which the Serbian people view themselves. One cannot overgeneralize an entire culture, but much that is influential in Serb ideology is conveyed in this film.
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