Josef (2011) Reviews

• tale of an identity

  Vincentiu2012-03-07

  ironic parable, it is a movie about survive in war time. in dark colors, with interesting characters, mixture of ash and sand, puzzle of stories, cynic, precise, harsh, bitter, Rubick cube of times and events, kind of Lord of flies without children but with same kind of men, a form of alternate history and game with possibilities of an alternative history, Josef is just slice of East recent past. because the war can be Jugoslavian or Chechenian. because crumbs of brave Svejk are pieces for every intention to present realities out of appearances in this case. because Josef is lesson of a jester. the memorable last meeting is relevant in this sense. his essence - the relativity of personal identity in every war, in every season.

• parable

  Kirpianuscus2017-04-29

  a parable. bitter, cynical, cruel. about the Central Europe in the XX century. not illusions, drops of faith, crazy situations and the survive as only purpose. a film about identity. and about refuges. about the clash of ordinaries lives with the war. and about the strange choices. that is all. far to be comfortable, remembering the theater of absurd, it is good opportunity to reflect. about history and people and two Josefs.

• Nice artistic ways of propaganda ...

  vojinvidanovic2017-05-28

  Very nice recreation of WWI settings, quite nice movie for Croatian cinema. Should be nice war drama, if it didn't have the "secret cause". It would held way higher rank if its plot driver wasn't so predictable and Myth based. For those not knowing, "Jozef" Josif Broz Tito was fighting on WWI front as Austrohungarian soldier, was shot, was captured and from war camp became member of Communists in Russia during revolution. Therese are the facts. Movie diverts from them using a subtle practice of uniform-identity change in survival, with no prior knowledge such practices were highly forbidden during WWI and were able to check documents. Its kind of anticommunist "Holocaust denial" what was done in the movie, because it should profaund effect history and generations of people as fake, based on fake premises. What is the goal? That we had a spy for a president? That he wasn't a Croat so Croatia doesn't have the most successful leader, because shunned Ustasha nationalism? Sad things. Croatia had most of independence until those days under Tito and has most developed of all of its time. I believe it also doesn't have a 1989 GDP in 2017. History isn't what one cherry picks.