Esma's Secret (Grbavica) (15)

A discreet but affecting drama about an emotionally scarred mother and her rebellious 12 year old daughter struggling for normality in post-war Sarajevo, former documentary director Jasmila Zbanic’s feature debut Esma’s Secret (originally titled Grbavica, the name of a poor quarter of Sarajevo which saw some of the worst acts of violence, rape, and ‘ethnic cleansing’ during the siege of the early 1990’s, and also, as Zbanic points out, highlighting the secret baggage the titular heroine carries with her, the word etymologically means “woman with a hump”) won the Golden Bear at this year’s Berlin Film Festival. A beautifully observed film, Zbanic’s filmmaking background works perfectly in studying this mother and daughter struggle, aided by two superb performances. Mirjana Karanovic (best known for her performances in the films of Emir Kusturica) plays Esma, a no-nonsense mother desperate to make ends meet and desperate to block out the past, while the deeply impressive Luna Mijovic plays Sara, the wilful and increasingly independent daughter whose need for money to go on a school trip dredges up some terrible memories and discoveries.

Struggling to make ends meet with the government handouts she receives, Esma takes on a second job waitressing at a dodgy nightclub; she really wants to make up the fee needed for her daughter’s trip. As Sara keeps reminding her, the other option is to produce a certificate that proves her father died a ‘shaheed’ (a war martyr) during the war. Esma seems unwilling, claiming the difficulty in acquiring the document as the father’s body was never found, and preferring to work hard for the money rather than bring up the past, even if it means spending less time with Sara. Frustrated by what she believes to be nonchalance and uncaring, Sara begins to rebel, hanging out with her classmate, Samir, with whom she starts a romantic friendship, and getting into fights as her other classmates tease her for not being on the list of shaheed’s children. As Esma struggles on, beginning a friendship with one of the nightclub’s bouncers (Lucey), Sara’s anger and frustration heighten until old wounds are violently re-opened.

Sticking to her realist documentarian roots, Zbanic imbues the film with a lack of fussiness or intrusion while enthusiastically observing the minute details of their lives, relationship and circumstances. Moving and emotional this film may be, but it is refreshingly lacking in any kind of over-sentimentalised need to look at the main characters either as victims or heroic survivors. Esma in particular is shown attending a support centre for widows and women war survivors not, as intended, to talk through the past and heal the psychological scars, but simply to receive the financial handouts. There is an incredibly telling scene, when one of the women begins to open up and tell her horrific story only to be interrupted by another woman trying her hardest to stifle her laughter. This not only acts as a kind of embarrassing moment of uncontrolled emotion but also enforces the idea that they desperately want to lay the memories to rest and get on with their lives, as difficult as this may be.

An extremely poignant and moving film, but ultimately uplifting and positive for it, the main flaw of the film is the fact that by the time the revelatory plot points come up, it is more than likely audiences have guessed what exactly Esma’s secret is well in advance. What helps the film over this are the two utterly compelling central performances. The true drama in the film is waiting to see when and how Esma finally divulges the truth and how Sara will react, and both Karanovic and Mijovic are so impressive here, the film still manages to surprise, move and enthral.