Time of the Gypsies

Дом за вешање
Dom za vešanje
Time of the Gypsies

Original Yugoslav poster
Directed by Emir Kusturica
Produced by Mirza Pašić
Harry Saltzman
Written by Emir Kusturica
Gordan Mihić
Starring Davor Dujmović
Bora Todorović
Ljubica Adžović
Music by Goran Bregović
Cinematography Vilko Filač
Edited by Andrija Zafranović
Distributed by Columbia Pictures
Release dates
  • 21 December 1988 (1988-12-21)
Running time
 140 minutes
Country United Kingdom
Italy
Yugoslavia
Language Romani
Serbo-Croatian
Italian

Time of the Gypsies (Serbian: Дом за вешање, Dom za vešanje, literally "Home for Hanging") is a 1988 Yugoslav film by Yugoslav director Emir Kusturica. Filmed in Romani and Serbo-Croatian, Time of the Gypsies tells the story of a young Romani man with magical powers who is tricked into engaging in petty crime. It is widely considered to be one of Kusturica's best films. The film was recorded in Sarajevo and Milan, by the Forum Sarajevo. The film was selected as the Yugoslav entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 62nd Academy Awards, but was not accepted as a nominee.[1]

The film revolves around Perhan, a romani teenager with telekinetic powers and his passage from boy to man that starts in a little village in Yugoslavia and that ends in the criminal underworld of Milan. The film deals with magic-realism.

The film's soundtrack was composed by Goran Bregović.

Plot

Perhan lives with his devoted grandmother Khaditza, his lame sister Danira and his dissolute uncle Merdzan. He wants to marry a girl named Azra, but her mother won't allow it, as Perhan is the illegitimate son of a Slovenian soldier who had an affair with Perhan's late mother. Ahmed, the "Gypsy sheik," comes to the village with his brothers. Merdzan loses his clothes playing cards with Ahmed's brothers, and comes home desperate for money so that he can repay. It is raining and not finding any money, he accuses the grandmother of hiding the money from him and lifts the frame of the house up (using a rope and a truck), so that it is suspended in mid-air as the rain comes down on Perhan, his grandmother and Danira. Very soon after, Khaditza is summoned to use her powers to save Ahmed's sick son, Roberto, which Khaditza does. For repayment, she proposes a deal with Ahmed - to pay for Danira's leg to be healed at a hospital in Ljubljana. Perhan goes with Danira, promising his grandmother not to leave her, but Ahmed asks where will he stay and convinces him to go to Milan. At first Perhan wants to make money honestly, but after being dragged through the mud, Perhan begins stealing and squirreling money away in a shack.

After being double-crossed by his brother Sadam, Ahmed appoints Perhan boss of the operation. Now relatively rich, Perhan goes home, where he is enraged to find Azra is pregnant. Perhan refuses to believe that the baby is his. They marry with the condition that she sell the baby. Perhan is also disappointed to find that the house Ahmed promised to build him is not being built at all, and that Danira was not operated on, but forced to be a beggar as part of Ahmed's money operation. On their wedding night, Azra tells him the child is theirs, and was conceived when they made love on the Feast of St George. Still wearing her wedding dress, Azra dies after giving birth to a boy while levitating mid-air. Because Ahmed leaves with the baby, which we discover later is also named Perhan, he is raised by Ahmed's crew.

After four years of searching, Perhan reunites with Danira in Rome, who leads him to Perhan Jr., whom Perhan now accepts as his child. Perhan drops the children off at the train station, promising to meet up with them after buying an accordion for his son and a present (sponges) for grandmother. The boy tells him he is mad at him because he will not return, and he will not get an accordion. Perhan assures him he will, "Cross my gypsy heart," but immediately runs out of the station to settle the score with Ahmed, who is about to be married. Perhan arrives at the wedding and kills Ahmed with a fork, using his telekinetic powers. He also kills Ahmed's brothers, but he is in turn killed by Ahmed's new wife. At the funeral, the grandmother passes out drinks to everyone and Perhan Jr. goes outside the house, peers through the window at his dead father, breaks the glass and steals the golden coins put on his father's eyes.

He passes them to his uncle Merdzan. Merdzan hurries with the coins for another round of gambling.

Cast

Awards

English language poster.

At the 1989 Cannes Film Festival, Emir Kusturica won the Best Director Award and the film was also nominated for a Palme d'Or (Golden Palm).[2] At the 26th Guldbagge Awards in Sweden, it won the award for Best Foreign Film.[3] In addition, Time of the Gypsies was nominated for Best Foreign Film at the 1990 César Awards in France.

See also

References

  1. ↑ Margaret Herrick Library, Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences
  2. ↑ "Festival de Cannes: Time of the Gypsies". festival-cannes.com. Retrieved 2009-08-01.
  3. ↑ "Dom za vesanje (1989)". Swedish Film Institute. 16 March 2014.

External links

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