The director Veljko Bulajic hosts an open screening of his documentary about the '63 earthquake that hit Skoplje, Macedonia, in front of the audience of survivors of said disaster. The movie shows the destroyed buildings in Skoplje; the international community sending airplanes with medical aid and food; the Yugoslav Army being sent to help find survivors under the rubble; people on the cemetary mourning their loved ones who died; the local community calling in people to try to identify unknown corpses without any documents; homeless people living in tents; workers starting reconstruction efforts and buildings new residential buildings; musicians performing on stage in front of the crowd. People live in barracks. It ends with new buildings being resurrected, announcing that the city will be renewed in '65, '66, '67.
Right after the disastrous '63 earthquake that hit Skoplje and destroyed over 70% of its buildings, the director Veljko Bulajic was contacted if he could make a film on the spot, and the result was this documentary that chronicles its aftermath. It starts off in a surprisingly creative, metafilm manner: the director announces a live screening of the film in front of hundreds of survivors in the audience, and then asks them to give their suggestions and complaints about the film so it can be amended. The opening credits start, consisting out of still frames of rescue workers saving people from the rubble. Then archive footage of people walking on the streets of Skoplje is shown, depicting life before the earthquake. At one point, as a group of women are marching on the street during 1 May, a man interupts the screening by standing in front of the screen, the film "freezes", and then one woman from the audience points at the scene: she recognizes herself in the frame, while the woman on the left is a certain Vaska Lazova, who went missing. At around 14 minutes into the film, there is an impressive sequence of dozens of brigadirs driving on trucks through the streets, observing destroyed residential buildings, in areas where almost nothing is left intact. The rest of the movie is strangely less interesting, sometimes even too routine, since Bulajic is somehow unable to extract some excitement, intrigue or engagement out of these scenes which only follow post-earthquake events. The final 30 minutes feel as if the movie is lost and doesn't know what to do with itself, showing only people walking on the streets, an especially the overlong 7-minute sequence of singers performing on the drums on stage, entertaining the audience, which has no place in the story and is suitable only for fast-forward button. "Skoplje '63" is thus one of those movies that are more valuable from a humanitarian than a cinematic standpoint.
Grade:++
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