Welcome to Sarajevo

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Stephen C 1 hour and 41 minutes of drama!!!!!!!!! Rated 5/5 Stars •  Rated 5 out of 5 stars 05/20/25 Full Review Audience Member Movie that shows the life of war correspondents and explores the line between staying objective or helping innocent civilians in war-torn Sarajevo during the previous war in Europe. Unfortunately this movie has become very topical again with the war in Ukraine. It painfully illustrates that we learn nothing from history, only that we will repeat it. Rated 3/5 Stars •  Rated 3 out of 5 stars 01/17/23 Full Review Audience Member There really isn't any plot, just life during wartime for some journalists in Yugoslavia showcasing the horrors of war. The Yugoslavian civil war was one of the more ugly, more complex, and most highly propagandized civil wars of the last century. Filmed in the immediate aftermath, the director makes extensive use of actual news footage to augment the staged scenes. This movie is an expression of the filmmakers opinion on an extraordinarily complex topic; nothing more, nothing less. There are numerous BBC documentaries available that are more informative, interesting, and accurate. Rated 2.5/5 Stars •  Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars 01/15/23 Full Review Audience Member Being born and raised in Sarajevo and having survived the brutal siege and bombardment of the city, I have mixed feelings about this movie. It’s the first among the few movies made about the war in Bosnia. The movie follows a lot of cliches but it distinguishes itself by using the actual documentary footage from the scenes of life in Sarajevo during the siege, namely the massacre of the civilians in Ferhadija Street in central Sarajevo, who lined up and waiting in queue for the daily bread rations, ended up being killed, maimed and mutilated by a mortar fired by the occupying Serb forces. The makers of the movie obviously attempted to get more attention for the movie by casting two American actors, Woody Harrelson and the Academy Award winner Marisa Tomei. Sadly, Harrelson’s character was portrayed as a cocky, self centered and egoistical American stereotype (a shame for a good actor such as harrelson) while Tomei’s character is barely developed into something a little more than an extra but still less of a supporting actress. The best performance by far is that of Goran Višnjić, and many say (and I agree) that this was his breakthrough role that got him noticed by Hollywood. He followed on to appear in the video of Madonna’s “Power of Goodbye” and then ER. The Croatian actor does an excellent job speaking with a distinct Sarajevo accent which is not easily done by native speakers. Overall, the movie is good. For me, it is also emotional due to the documentary footage used in the movie, but I still watch it from time to time. In the end, the movie offers a message (vague and thin but still present) that hope lives on and that everything bad eventually comes to an end. It is also a story of personal redemption of the main character, the British journalist through whose eyes we actually watch the story. With some parts overdone (especially the nonsensical monologue by the boy from the church) and others started but not fully developed, the movie has its good and bad parts but overall, the makers of the movie did at least try to make an attempt to make the movie as authentic as possible which was quite challenging to do so soon after the war ended. The movie didn’t get a wide release in the United States, mainly because of the usage of the documentary footage featuring rather graphic scenes from the Ferhadija Street massacre. I still highly recommend this movie, especially to those who want to learn more about the region and the war itself - but only as an introduction. The subject itself is too complex and it’s still being written, and that it would be impossible to cover it fully in one movie. Rated 3.5/5 Stars •  Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars 08/14/20 Full Review brendan n Welcome to Sarajevo was a film that missed the masses, and the mishandling of the film is the Weinstein's. They may have the reputation of being indie in spirit, but they also had a knack for letting films vanish. This is a great film and one of the better recent depictions on the subject. Winterbottom has been one of my favourite filmmakers for quite some time and finally tracking this down was a priority for me. Strong central performances and a relatable true story, that holds nothing back. 29/06/2019 Rated 5/5 Stars •  Rated 5 out of 5 stars 03/31/23 Full Review Audience Member Suffers a bit from the "Mighty Whitey" hero cliché, but it's otherwise pretty great, especially in the third act. Rated 4.5/5 Stars •  Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars 01/30/23 Full Review Read all reviews

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