Reality is cruel in “You have the night”

..."spreads a strong and unique message that life isn’t always a fairy tale."

We organised a film critic workshop for high school students in collaboration with Cinedays 2018 and Critical camp. This is one of the reviews written during the workshop.

Cast: Jasna Djuricic, Boris Isakovic, Nikola Manojlovic,  Ivana Vukovic

Genre: Drama

Director: Ivan Salatic

Released: 5th September (Italy)

This movie is written and directed by Ivan Salatic and it is actually his first feature film. The story revolves around a woman named Sanja (Ivana Vukovic), who works in the huge cruiser as a cleaning lady. Some time passes and she returns home to her son, brother and lover, where everything seems to be going wrong, due to the bankruptcy of the shipyard that leaves so many people unemployed. Fury, sadness and dissatisfaction of life were the main things that I was able to feel while watching the movie.

What really gives this movie a visual perfection is the color spectrum used in the motion picture – everything we see is gray and dark with sad and depressing colors. The camera is very steady which gives the viewers a very realistic atmosphere impression. The cinematography (by Ivan Markovic) and the movie editing (Jelena Maksimovic) were extremely good. The fantastic editing let me, as a part of the audience, focus on the story and enter the movie world that Salatic created.

There isn’t much music in the movie, but there are many different sound effects which add a lot of details to the story in the film. For example, in every single scene the audience can feel the presence of the massive ships. This sets a really strong example of the power of the sound design in the movie. Also the continuous sound of the wind playing with the leаvеs reminds the audience of the chilly weather. The set design had its own greatness, because all scenes have been filmed outside on authentic locations.

The acting is well done and even though there is very little dialogue, the audience can understand the story from the way the actors reacted to everything around them. That is the main way the story was told. However, everything in the movie is slow paced for purpose of depicting the characters being stuck in their own lives with a will to escape from all the negativity. There is no room for extreme and outstanding make up and costumes, but they are adequate for the story and the whole contemporary period. Salatic is a very experienced film maker, because this movie is really challenging not only to make, but also to be made understandable for the audience.

“You have the night” spreads a strong and unique message that life isn’t always a fairy tale, which is a great thing to tell the audience especially if a huge part of them are rookies in the adulthood.

Evgenija Arsova

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