The film "It's Hard to be Nice" directed by Srdjan Vuletic, looks at the postwar emotional landscape of Bosnia, where a collective post traumatic stress disorder has taken hold and defined the normal relations between people. The main character, Fudo, and his friends treat each other with utter contempt, cheating and violently confronting each other at the slightest offense. The outside world is seen with equal hostility, as robbers scan the home addresses of foreigners on extended stay in Sarajevo, targeting their home apartments in Germany and Holland for burglary by accomplices. He wants to be at peace with the world, but that's not so easy, when he is being beaten down by the people and circumstance around him. Almost at the breaking point, in the final scenes he stands bloody and enraged, and stares into the eyes of a young child, deciding what to do.
Sasa Petrovic's performance as Fudo is effective, and he won the best actor award in Sarajevo in 2007 for this role. This is not surprising, considering this is just the type of role that goes over especially well at Sarajevo. Daria Lorenci also does well as his wife Azra. The story is fairly simple, a week-in-the-life formula, and the conflict is on-going and essentially unresolved in the end. This works well, because it reflects the reality of life in Bosnia where an uncertain surreal peace fails to totally mask the wounds. Whether those wounds are healing or festering is still anyone's guess. Bosnian audiences respond positively to a story like this, because it brings these questions out into the open and suggests the possibility that this torn nation will heal through sheer force of reason. It is a pleasant film, but it doesn't really break any new ground. Worth seeing, but don't expect an epiphany.
