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Emir Kusturica (Serbian Cyrillic: Емир Кустурица; IPA: [ˈku.stu.ri.tsa]) (born November 24, 1954 in Sarajevo) is a Serbian filmmaker and actor.
With an impressive string of internationally acclaimed features, Kusturica is seen as one of the most creative directors in cinema during the 1980s and '90s. As well as being one of the few directors to win the Palme d'Or at Cannes twice (for When Father Was Away on Business and Underground), he is also a recipient of the French Ordre des Arts et des Lettres.
Black Cat, White Cat (Serbian: Црна мачка, бели мачор, Crna mačka, beli mačor) is a Yugoslavian Romantic comedy film directed by Emir Kusturica in 1998. It won the Silver Lion for best direction at the Venice Film Festival.
The literal translation of the title is actually "Black cat, white tomcat". The movie characters speak in Romani, Serbian and Bulgarian - frequently switching between them.
Plot
Matko Destanov, a small-time Roma smuggler and profiteer, is living with his teenage son Zare by the Danube River in eastern Serbia near the Bulgarian border.
He has plans to acquire a whole train of smuggled fuel, which he finds at cut-price. To obtain a loan that would subsidize the heist, he visits Grga Pitić, a wheelchair-bound old gangster, who's an old friend of Zarije Destanov, Matko's father and Zare's grandfather. Matko then plots the details of the job with an ally of his named Dadan, a rich, fun-living, drug-snorting gangster type who has a harem, juggles grenades and cheats at cards. However, Dadan double-crosses him and glitches up the deal by giving Matko a drink that is drugged, and carrying out the job while Matko is unconscious, which means that Matko owes Dadan a great deal of cash. Matko cannot afford to pay, so Dadan makes a deal whereby he would forgive the debt, thereby wiping the slate clean, if Zare and Afrodita, Dadan's midget sister whom he desperately wants to marry off, get married. However, Zare is in love with Ida, a barmaid who works in an establishment run by her Roma grandmother Sujka, and Afrodita is waiting for the man of her dreams. Dadan coerces Afrodita into marrying by dunking her in a well, while Zare first learns of the scheme to marry him off from Ida, who has overheard Dadan and Matko plotting it in the restaurant where she works. Meanwhile, Zare retrieves Zarije from the hospital where he is being kept, with the aid of a gypsy band.
The two reluctantly endure the wedding ceremony held at Matko's house, which Dadan refuses to postpone after the sudden apparent death of Zarije. They were not supposed to have a wedding while in mourning, but Dadan decides to delay the death announcement, so Matko and Zare hide Zarije's body in the attic, packed in ice. Zare is dismayed, since he wants to leave the place, and had hoped that the required mourning period for his beloved grandfather would give him the opportunity to get away, and thus avoid being married off against his will. Ida and Sujka provide the catering for the wedding, and Ida is upset at seeing her beloved married off to someone else. By contrast, Dadan is really enjoying himself, whether dancing to gypsy band music, bouncing on the bed with his harem, and juggling grenades. However, the bride runs away mid-ceremony, pursued by Dadan and Matko. She stumbles across a six-foot plus giant named Grga Veliki, who is willing to protect her from her villainous brother, and the couple fall instantly in love. Grga Veliki's grandfather, Grga Pitić, wants him to get married, and is delighted that he has found his mate. The old gangster forces Dadan, who had once worked for him, to accept the match.
The groom meanwhile conspires with Sujka and Ida to bring Dadan down a peg, and rigs the outhouse so that the seat will come apart. While the preparations for the wedding ceremony of Afrodita and Grga Veliki are being conducted, Matko and Dadan pass the time by playing cards, with Dadan cheating. Sujka comes in during the game, and serves the unsuspecting Dadan a drink spiked with something that would give him diarrhea. Furthermore, Grga Pitić apparently dies, and Dadan and Matko hide his body in the attic, where Zarije's body is also hidden. However, the two corpses soon both come back to life; they were not dead after all. They are surprised to find themselves together, as they had not seen each other for 25 years and each had thought the other was dead. During the ceremony, Dadan starts to feel uncomfortable and rushes into the outhouse ... and falls into the manure. His harem deserts him, and as he tries to clean himself off on a goose, only Matko remains loyal, and he provides Dadan with a shower from the garden hose. Zare meanwhile grabs the wedding official at gunpoint and orders him to solemnize his marriage with his sweetheart, Ida, and the two sail off together on a riverboat with a fistful of cash stashed in his grandfather's accordion, and the blessing of their respective grandparents.
[edit] Themes
There are many recurring gags throughout the film, for example a scene where a pig is devouring a rusty old Trabant, and the appearance of the titular two cats (a black one and a white one), who end up as the only witnesses to Zare and Ida's wedding. Also, Grga Pitić is obsessed with the last line in the film Casablanca, "this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship," which he says to Zarije at the end, after both came back from having apparently died.
[edit] Inspiration
The film is strongly inspired by an influential Italian comics series, Alan Ford by Roberto Raviola and Luciano Secchi. In a scene of the film you can clearly see one of the characters reading an issue of the Yugoslavian version of Alan Ford.
In collabration with Wikipedia
