Breza

Set in a remote village in the earlier years of the previous century, this is a sensitive and slow moving film very similar to Italian neo-realist films such as Ermanno Olmi's "Tree of Wooden Clogs". Filmed on location, and mostly with local rural people who are not professional actors, it documents (in a most convincing and authentic way) a time when Christian faith and ancient folklore intermingled in the the minds of peasants struggling to scrape a meagre living from the land, bearing their hardships and illnesses with a sufferant acceptance.

It documents a short period in the life of the village during which two funerals and two weddings take place, and it inter-cuts images from these events to emphasise the fragility of human life, how quickly beauty and pleasure pass, and how we are caught up in the pace, demands and pleasures of life, and only seldomly, often too late, have the time and inclination to reflect on what is really important.