The Night of the Dead
Original title Mrtva noč
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The village of Rascane, together with its’ hamlets, is situated between the towns of Zagvozd and Vrgorac, on the continental side of the mountain of Biokovo, in Dalmatian hinterland. The villagers have preserved the custom of bell chiming for the dead, i.e. synchronized manual ringing by using the ropes of the bell of the parish church of St. Mihovil in the village of Rascane. The villagers chime the bells in pair, both the male and the female bell. They start chiming at the dusk of All Saints’ Day, on November 1, and they chime for as long as there are those willing to do that, usually until Midnight. They call this night the Night of the Dead. In the past, bell chiming could last until morning. Besides those who come to chime the bell, other villagers also gather around, the members of their families and children, to talk and warm up by the fire. The film presents the content and the performance of this custom, the importance it has for its carriers and the contemporary social context of its existence, which includes everyday life of the villagers and their worldviews which form their identity.
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Author/s Branko Ištvančić
Branko Ištvančić – Film and TV director Was born in Subotica, in 1967. Graduated film and TV direction in 1999 at Academy of Dramatic Arts in Zagreb capital of Croatia. Making his first, documentary films on 8 mm camera at 15, he has continuously been involved with documentary films and has received Croatian as well as international rewards for his work – The Grand Prix at Croatian Short and Documentary Film Festival, \”Oktavijan\” and \”Zlatna Uljanica\” being among them. His student short fiction Saying Goodbye / Rastanak was included in the New Direction programme of The First Film Foundation in London, a selection of six outstanding films by promising European directors. Deeply enrooted in the Croatian documentary tradition, he pays special attention to the humane, but also humoristic, treatment of his subjects. His successfully film, Wellman / Bunarman (2003), continues this tradition, and elevates the simple story about a well digger to a level of the universal metaphor, but without the pretentious nature of many Croatian documentaries. The critics consider his film The Cormorant Scarecrow / Plasitelj Kormorana (1998) to be one of the best Croatian documentaries of the nineties. Member of Croatian Film Director\’s Guild
Research Vido Bagur, folklorist
Photography Branko Cahun
Sound Dario Macesić
Editing Mladen Radaković