Academic Film Center Belgrade was founded in 1958, in what was then socialist Yugoslavia, under the name of Academic Cine Club. Throughout its long history, the film and video artists who worked there made it one of the most significant and celebrated film clubs in Yugoslavia. AFC membership included some of Yugoslavia’s most famous cinematographers (Tomislav Gotovac, Živojin Pavlović, Kokan Rakonjac, Dragoslav Lazić, Sava Trifković…), but also exceptional amateur and alternative filmmakers, and in the 21st century, visual artists and activists (Ivko Šešić, Nikola Đurić, Bojan Jovanović, Miodrag Milošević, Igor Toholj, Doplgenger Artist Duo, Julijana Terek, Zorica Kijevčanin, Biljana Belić, Ivana Todorović…). In 1976 AFC became part of the Student’s City Cultural Center, a government-funded public institution for student culture.

In 1982 AFC founded the Alternative Film Archive to take care of its film and video heritage, which now holds over 800 AFC-produced films and videos. In the same year, AFC also started Alternative Film/Video Festival (1982–1990, renewed in 2003), one of the oldest festivals in the region dedicated exclusively to experimental and alternative filmmaking. AFC is still an open space for experimentation in filmmaking processes of all types, especially for students and young authors.

This compilation presents a selection of films that were made in the Academic Film Center in the first three decades of its existence; films that indicate the themes that preoccupied the cine club in its formative years.

Curated by Milan Milosavljević

(Radoslav Vladić, 1977, 8 min)

Opening the program, a domestic ethnography by Radoslav Vladić – who became a professional cinematographer for film and television – that takes us on a journey through his personal (family) spaces, creating an authentic personal record of time and place.

(Nikola Đurić, 1973, 6 min)

Raven is a short structuralist film that follows the motions of a flying bird in which author juxtaposes the symbolism of a raven with the poetic concept of how freely birds fly.

(Tomislav Gotovac, 1964, 10 min)

In Direction, famous Yugoslavian/Croatian artist Tomislav Gotovac tries to resolve the problem of a single, long, continuously moving shot of Belgrade’s Revolution Boulevard in the 1960s.

(Miodrag Tarana & Mirko Avramović, 1972, 3 min)

Through their playing – almost dancing – with the camera, the creators of From Me To You show us the design of their formal collaboration.

(Vjekoslav Nakić, 1970, 6 min)

Vjekoslav Nakić explores possibilities of film frame composition using interesting short interval sounds and inserting film crew as a part of that composition.

(Zoran Saveski, 1980, 10 min)

Organon pulls us into a strange occurrence; a dreamlike atmosphere captured in beautiful footage taken both on and under the water.

(Nikola Đurić, 1973, 8 min)

In his second film in this program, Nikola Đurić takes inspiration from the Arthur Rimbaud poem, which he transposes into cinematic language using different forms of camera manipulation and editing.

(Igor Toholj, 1989, 3 min)

Igor Toholj uses a stranded electricity pylon as a metaphor for the encroaching end of the old political system in Death of Metalosaurus.

(Sava Trifković, 1962, 10 min)

Sava Trifković’s cult short film Hands in the Purple Distances presents the inner horror of its protagonist, sited somewhere on a gradient between the fear of emptiness and open space, to the fear of death.

(Bojana Vujanović, 1972, 2 min)

Bojana Vujanović, the sole woman director in this program, directs Journey, a claustrophobic voyage that takes place in an old elevator.

(Ljubomir Šimunić, 1970-75, 15 min)

Pression is the masterpiece of Ljubomir Šimunić, who worked outside of AFC. Unlike most amateur and alternative short films, it was made over several years, throughout which he double-exposed select frames over time to achieve resonant overlapping.

Milan Milosavljević, born in 1980 in Ruma, Serbia, is the co-founder of the Independent Film Center Vorky Team, together with Dragan Cakic, in memory of film artist Slavko Vorkapich. Since 2009, he has been working as a curator and program organizer at the Academic Film Center of the Students’ City Cultural Center in Belgrade. In charge of the European Festival of Animated Film Balkanima and the Alternative Film / Video Festival (est. 1982; dedicated to experimental film).

Milosavljević works as an author, producer, and editor of AFC and Vorky Team films, which were screened at more than 150 film festivals, among them Berlinale and IFF Rotterdam. In 2018/2019 he worked with author Maja Novaković as a producer on the very successful short documentary film Then Comes the Evening. In 2020, he started a new production company, Kinematika, focused on the production of short animation, documentary, and experimental films.