In his grim, outstanding, at times darkly humorous Guardians Of The Formula (2023), director Dragan Bjelogrlić treads the perilous tightrope between genre-generated sentiment and genuine emotion, arriving at an incredibly humane, candid story on the moralities of scientific experiment. A truly moving meditation on what courage, at its core, really is.
Full disclosure — I did cry at the cinema, which does not happen that often. The reasons might be manifold, but Bjelogrlić’s ability to resurrect the very specific, idiosyncratic, fiercely future-orientated spirit of ex-Yugoslavia (the country of my birth), in such a finely calibrated manner, could have been a factor. The carefully selected costumes, authentic to the last button and crease, the muted, real-socialist production design (it was filmed on actual locations), and the eerie mood of the entire landscape of the story are pitch-perfect — both in detail and hue.
As is its austere, yet luminous photography (kudos, DOP Ivan Kostić).
The time is Cold War Europe, in 1958 — and the aftermath of a factual harrowing reactor incident at the Vinča Nuclear Institute near Belgrade, a top-secret Yugoslav government experiment gone wrong. The screenplay was based on the novel The Case of Vinča by professor Goran Milašinović (who collaborated in the writing of the smooth script with Vuk Ršumović, Ognjen Sviličić, and Bjelogrlić, himself), and follows the fate of the four physicists involved (in RL there were six), exposed to a lethal dose of radiation.
A compact team of three enthusiastic twenty-somethings, fresh from college, is led by their much less uncomplicated professor, Dr Dragoslav Popović (Radivoje Bukvić, mesmerising, saturnine and convincing), the only one privy to the real aims of tests carried out.
The Yugoslav secret police immediately sends them to France, through hefty diplomatic connections, to be treated by a very anti-nuclear and pacifist Dr Georges Mathé (a terrific Alexis Manenti, dedicated, enigmatic, unfazed), at the Curie Institute in Paris, which leads to a medical breakthrough — the first human bone marrow transplants between unrelated donors and hosts in history. And a chasm between ethics and ideology.
Although Yugoslavia was small and non-aligned country, firmly sandwiched between the two opposed military super-powers, and two gargantuan political blocks — its was still staunchly socialist (read: communist), and its ambitions were limitless. Therefore, the clandestine goal of the experiments was creating one’s own nuclear arsenal.
If the film centred on merely that piece of little-known Yugoslav history, it would have been intriguing enough. But, it delves much deeper, and is more universal in its reach, encompassing the absolutely heroic French donor counterparts, and examining the motivations of the two men of science in a very personal race towards professional achievement. One, in the business of saving lives (unfortunate casualties included), and the other — with a high drive to innovate, sunken into the obscure mechanics of the state, interfering with powers whose far-reaching potential could annihilate human existence, itself.
The acting in Guardians Of The Formula is equally impeccable as is its staging, bar a few episodic turns, with entirely committed performances, across the board — my favourites being the quartet of the three young scientists (Ognjen Micović, Alisa Radaković, Jovan Jovanović), and one of the French donors (Anne Serra), bringing a necessary youthful charm and lightheartedness to what would have been a hard story to sit through.
The scene where the three Yugoslav junior physicists, deadly ill, manage to catch Radio Belgrade on a tiny device, and jump with joy, waltzing, when hearing the familiar tunes of the enchanting Čamac na Tisi (1955), was not only a wonderfully poetic piece of filmmaking, but true to events.
Were it not for the occasional ill-advised directorial flourishes, such as Bjelogrlić’s default overwhelming use of an otherwise excellent score (Aleksandar Ranđelović) to accentuate that which is already sufficiently dramatic on-screen, along with moments where less words would have meant more impact (seriously denting a great story), and a few glitches in casting (i.e. casting oneself as spy chief Aleksandar Leka Ranković), Guardians Of The Formula could have become a sure go-to in the apocalyptic years we are now witnessing, such as was HBO’s Chernobyl.
In particular, due to its compelling, bare storyline, its blunt Cold-War-Era 1950s aesthetics, and steady emphasis on the beauty of human solidarity in face of a catastrophe — overriding the hubristic impulse that had caused the calamity, in the first place.
As it stands, it is still a powerful and praiseworthy effort (seven years in the making), and should be seen, for its own significant merits — despite its flaws.
★★★★☆
Author: ©Milana Vujkov
Lola On Film 