Jelena Popovic is a Serbian citizen in her early 30s and, just as with her fellow Generation X’ers in Eastern Europe, travelling and moving away from home is much easier for her than it would have been for her parents. Borders today are open, or at least far more open than they once had been, English is the universal language, and one can get online even in the middle of a park. However, this seemingly ideal situation has hardships up its sleeve that catch our traveller completely off guard.
Documenting snippets of Jelena’s six-month stay in Hungary, the film moves away from an arrival full of hopes and plans — first at a slower pace that soon becomes more like a free fall — to a state of despair, where she feels as if someone had pulled the ground out from underneath her feet. All the excitement and countless new opportunities notwithstanding, what started out as a road to self-discovery and self-actualisation therefore turns into a gridlock, where nothing is certain, there’s nothing to hold on to, and even time itself feels as if it had been stopped.
The project was supported by the European Union`s European Integration Fund.
main cast:
Jelena Popović
other cast:
Judit Friedrich
Zdravka Popović
Attila Lotz
William Robb
Predrag Nikolić
Dženana Huseinović
Jovana Radaković
Branislav Tošić
Nina Pupovac
Nathan Kay
Erika Répássy
Dávid Pápai
Krisztina Patai
Zsófia Horváth
Gojko Popović
Aleksandar Cupić
Tamás Zsidai
director: Zsófia Szilágyi
producer: Sára László, Marcell Gerő
director of photography: Claudia Kovács
editor: Noémi Mehrli
line producer: Melinda Erdős
production manager: Inez Mátis
production assistant: Barbara Héger, Eszter Szőllősi
location sound: Gábor Bányai, Dániel Bőhm, Szabolcs Gáspár, Gergely Hollósi, Péter Benjámin Lukács, Ádám Várhegyi, Rudolf Várhegyi
post-production sound: Tamás Székely
assistant editor: Balázs Simonffy
colorist: György Szitár-Csanádi
graphist: Barnabás Trunkó
translation: Csaba Bálint, Shih Bullet, Júlia Jancsik, Attila Kiss, Ferenc Lavro, Mila Turajlic, Todd Williams, Tünde Troján, Lomić Vesna
lawyer: Dr., Róbert Gábor Nagy
accountant: Gabriella Bedő
tainee: Anikó Mangold, Adrienn Szabó
camera: Attila Bíró, Péter Kotschy, SPARKS CAMERA AND LITHING LTD., Moving Pictures
BuDoku - Documentary Film Festival of Budapest, Hungary, 2014
in official selection
Colours Festival, Hungary, 2014
in official program