1. How do you see short film? Why does short film matter? What are its greatest strengths and virtues?

To tell the truth, lately it does not really make much difference to me whether the film is short or feature, as long as it conveys an emotion to me. Short film seems important because it most often serves as a sort of training ground for feature film, and it is especially important for people who are just starting out in filmmaking. It is particularly important for us students because it is a way for us to practice and discover what it means to make a film. It is a go-to format for young authors, but most try to transition to feature film as soon as they can to continue developing their skills in that medium. This is perhaps a shame because directors very rarely return to short film after becoming more successful. There is definitely a certain magic to short film, but it is also a very slippery slope. In feature film it is possible to let slide a few weak scenes if the rest is really top notch, but in short film, a single bad scene can ruin the whole thing. 

2. What is your favorite short film and why? – Could you also choose one of the titles from out database that you would especially recommend our users to see? :)

For me, the most important thing is for a film to leave me with something after I’ve seen it, that it makes me feel something. It might be impressive directing, a strong emotion, good acting or writing… simply, I want it to make any sort of impression on me. The one thing I really dislike is short films with a “message”, the Paolo Coelho-style aphorism. Unfortunately, most first short films fall into this trap. YouTube is full of short films with those fake ‘laurels’ and it is hard to find good shorts online. I am glad there is a platform like croatian.film where you get a chance to see some good stuff, whereas for foreign films, I usually visit the websites of major festivals from a few years back or browse around Vimeo. As for a recommendation, perhaps I won’t be entirely objective, because it was one of the first short films I had seen. It was around the time I started high school, at a Blank film workshop. It was a film called Terrarium, directed by Hana Jušić. I remember seeing it for the first time and being completely floored. All of us grow up watching feature films and we are used to a certain form and story outline, so when you encounter the short form for the first time, it opens up your chakras in a way, you realize just how much is possible within the short film format. Terrarium was just that for me, an introduction to the short form. I would also recommend Boris Poljak’s They Just Come and Go, Josip Lukić’s Boo-boo Boo hoo hoo and Nine Months, as well as Marko Jukić’s Milk and Honey. All of these have influenced me in some respect and I love each of them for entirely different reasons, but they all had “that something”.   

3. The Fall of Our Summer, your undergraduate diploma film at the Film and TV Directing department of the Academy of Dramatic Art in Zagreb earned you the Golden Pram for Best Short in the Checkers program at this year’s Zagreb Film Festival. Congratulations on this success! What does this recognition mean to you personally and to you as a director? What was the feedback like? 

The Golden Pram Award definitely means a lot, not just to me, but to the entire team that worked on the film as well. For me, this was definitely the worst shoot I’ve done so far, because it was done amidst complete chaos, but something still pushed us to finish it. So it is really nice to see the film gaining recognition in the end. While we were making it, I certainly did not expect to win this award. You always start out wanting to make a good film, but when you are the director, actor and editor all at once… all those initial ambitions and passions you have for the film evaporate. Only now, after the premiere and after the material has settled, I am able to see it with fresh eyes. The feedback from the people meant a lot, because the film was more or less unavailable until the Zagreb Film Festival premiere. That period before it is released into the world is really anxiety-inducing, you really cannot remain objective about it and the best thing you can hope for is that it won’t be too embarrassing once it’s out… 

The feedback after the screening was great, and I was glad to receive it from the people whose opinion means a lot to me. There was a lot of feedback precisely because the festival took place both on-site and online, so, the next day I got a lot of messages from people who were able to see the film online. Many people got in touch and said they loved the film even before the award, so I was really glad about that. 

4.   You did most of the heavy lifting on the film yourself – being the scriptwriter, director, producer, editor and even playing the lead character. Would it be safe to say this was a very personal project for you?

This was my undergraduate diploma film at the department of Film and TV Directing at the Academy of Dramatic Art. I had been preparing an entirely different script the entire semester, but about a week before we were supposed film it, I decided to cancel the whole thing and prepare something entirely different. I have come to realize that if I mull over an idea for too long, it starts to rot in my head. Most of what I had done before was created in a very short period of time, within two or three months, so I was comfortable with this sort of work process. I was not really convinced with the initial idea, so I decided to take a gamble thinking I’d rather make a bad film than force myself to make one I didn’t believe in. The Fall of Our Summer poured out of me very quickly. I settled on an outline within a few days, but there was no time to prepare because I only had a month and a half to complete it before my graduate studies entry exam. Ivor Lapić, who was supposed to be the cinematographer on the initial project, was with me throughout the entire process, so he decided to take on the new challenge. It was pretty chaotic, so I decided to take on a lot for myself, which seemed easier than putting together a whole crew, since the entire process was unruly and split into several intervals. In terms of the story, the idea itself was quite personal for me, so it seemed only right to play one of the characters as well. I knew if I did not try it now, I definitely would not have a chance to be both behind and in front of the camera after the Academy.   

5. What were the main challenges working on this film and how was the experience different from your previous projects?  

The main challenge was that we went into this shoot quite haphazardly, with the smallest crew I ever worked with. The cinematographer very often doubled as the sound mixer. There was no script, we just had a general idea and the atmosphere we wanted to convey. It was definitely challenging getting in front of the camera, which I thought would be easier, but it was absolute hell. When you are directing a film you are also acting in, you do not have the luxury of watching a scene while the actors are doing it. I ended up worrying the entire time about what we were shooting and I would only get to see the material at the end of the day. But you still observe yourself as an actor and fail to notice certain things you should be paying attention to from the director’s point of view, in a sense, you lose a sense of objectivity. I would not have been able to pull this off if I had not had a cinematographer I could trust completely, so I’d say he became a second director of the film.  

6.   How much improvisation is there in the film?  

When we started filming, there was practically no script at all. I more or less had an outline of the film in my head. The dialogues were mostly improvised, but I had a general idea of where a particular scene should fit, which is something we arrived at together by redoing the scenes several times.  

 7.   How did you choose the other cast members and did you adjust the characters to their own personalities?  

I had a broad idea of all the characters in my head. I immediately asked Lidija Penić-Grgaš to be in the film because we had worked a lot together, so I knew I could trust her to improvise and that the lack of script would not be a problem for her. I met Aneta Grabovac, who plays the main character, last summer at another shoot and I knew she would be excellent for the part. She immediately said yes after I told her we would not have a script and it would just be improv. We clicked, she immediately got the feel for the film and it was great working with her. There are many supporting roles in the film, but the process was the same with everyone: I would explain the scene to them and we would start filming. I am really happy with everyone’s performances, including the non-actors, because they succeeded in being true to themselves in the scenes. I chose to put myself in the film since the whole process was so personal, so subconsciously I thought I should. Also, since the whole idea for the film came so late, I was afraid to look for the main actor. I doubt I’ll do something like that again.   

8. In the Fall, it seemed that the documentary approach to fiction filmmaking stylistically really suited you. How did this come about and did you have any direct influences? 

I think everything I did before the Fall and at the Academy relied on documentary filmmaking in a way, along with considerable amount of improvisation. This sort of poetics suits me at the moment and I find it difficult working with actors without giving them total freedom. Also, I cannot just set up the camera in one spot and do countless retakes of the same scene. I like every shot to seem fresh, but with so many repetitions, the whole filming process quickly becomes stale. I am glad that each take brings something new to the table and I love constantly changing camera angles and character’s lines. In the end this always reveals something entirely different than what you started out with. In terms of influences for this film, cinematographer Ivor Lapić and I had been watching a lot of Safdie brothers films (The Pleasure of Being Robbed, Daddy Longlegs, John’s Gone), so we tried to emulate the poetics of these films.