tuckerbjones I've seen a lot of movies from the Western Balkans in the last two years (about 30 out of the last 40 movies I've seen are from the former Yugoslavia) but this one stands out the most. This is the only movie on IMDb that I've given a 10-star rating. The movie seems to be pretty fair to both the Americans and the Serbs, with each put into moral dilemmas and not necessarily making the best choices. The consequences of the war on everyday people in Belgrade are also evident, with several named characters dying throughout the film. Other reviewers say that this movie is made to make Serbs look like powerless victims, but that's actually how the majority of Belgrade residents viewed themselves. Whether that's accurate or not is up for debate. Still, the movie is made by Belgraders about Belgraders, so expect some mild bias. I found that only a few of the main characters were really flat while most of the core crew was fairly well-developed. Each grappled with issues of divided loyalties.Other reviewers have mentioned that the movie seems incomplete and that the editing is at times choppy and hard to understand. This is absolutely true. However, the moment when the editing gets choppy is the moment when the editor character dies. The movie is quite meta; the audience is meant to believe that the characters in the film actually produced the film and so as the on-screen film team falls into chaos, so does the clarity and production quality of the movie that the audience is watching. I found that this added to the movie, while other reviewers think it took away from it. Your call. I honestly wasn't expecting a masterpiece. Movies about movies, just like poems about poetry, songs about singing, or other art about art, can easily become self-indulgent and plain boring. However, Rat Uzivo/War Live is indeed a masterpiece. It manages not to be excessively self- indulgent but instead meta in all the best ways. (Also, I was amazed to see the logo of the Durham Bulls, my local minor league baseball team, on the hat of Harvey the American. Unexpected moment of North Carolina pride.)

edlund-5 This is a very good movie, made during the final months of the Milosevic regime. It is critical to the regime, but also represents the feelings of normal people from Belgrade during the NATO bombings. People who don't know anything about the bombings could read something before watching. During this time the Serbs were (still) represented by the "free" media as ruthless savages. This film deals with these issues as well. The story is very original, the idea belonged to Dragan Bjelogrlic, and the script was written by Nikola Pejakovic. If you have watched "Lepa sela lepo gore" - Bjelogrlic there played Milan, and Pejakovic - Halil. In "Rat uzivo" you can see some of the best Serbian actors. 10 points from Bulgaria :)

Jasmine Jade I can't believe this terrible film was made by the same people who made Lepa Sela Lepo Gore. Watch that and skip this. The plot is muddled and the characters are mostly two-dimensional stereotypes. I suspect the editor went on vacation halfway through the film because quick, choppy cuts start to appear that only confuse matters rather than elucidate them. The ending doesn't make sense either.This is predominantly a propaganda film made so Serbs can feel sorry for themselves and vilify America for the NATO bombings of 1999. They do this by perpetuating lies about Serbs being our allies during WWII, claiming the whole world is unjustly against them, and completely ignoring everything said and done by Slobodan Milosevic, like waging war on three neighboring countries. They seem intent on making a political film but only show a few seconds of Milosevic on a TV screen with no sound. A nationalist agenda obviously superseded any consideration of art which was not the case with Lepa Sela.Regrettably, I recommended this film to a teacher when it played last week at the Seattle International Film Festival. He also cited the bad editing and confusing plot, and I had to apologize for the bad advice. You've been warned.

mweston This film, which was Yugoslavia's nomination for best foreign language film of 2001, starts as an entertaining comedy about the making of an underfunded independent film in Yugoslavia.Later it turns into more of a drama, but somehow I was left behind at the transition. The acting is probably better than I realized at the time, because the actors were convincingly bad actors in the film within the film, which is likely harder than it looks. Seen at Cinequest (the San Jose, CA film festival) on 2/22/2002.