World War Two ended more than three-quarters of a century ago and slowly but inevitably perishes from living memory. In Croatia, however, it is still a very relevant subject, especially in the realm of politics where differences in views on contemporary issues play second fiddle to the question of which side someone’s ancestor fought for in the global conflict. This could be explained, to a certain degree, by the fact that World War II was particularly destructive in a small and relatively poor country like Croatia, causing more bloodshed and destruction than in any time before or since. And, to make things even worse, most of that bloodshed and destruction was caused by Croatians themselves, resulting in one of the darkest and most shameful chapters of national history. That war drew out the worst in people, but it also drew out the best. One example of the latter is the subject of The Diary of Diana B., the 2019 biopic directed by Croatian filmmaker Dana Budisavljević.
The film’s protagonist is the author’s distant relative Diana Budisavljević, a woman often described as Croatia’s closest equivalent to Oskar Schindler. She was actually Austrian; in her youth she married Julije Budisavljević, a Croatian Serb surgeon who would later become a member of the city’s social elite in Zagreb in the pre-WW2 years. In April 1941 the city and the rest of Croatia was occupied by Nazi Germany and their Axis allies; they installed the puppet regime of the Independent State of Croatia, led by the fascist Ustasha movement, whose platform called for the elimination of all non-Croats, namely Serbs, Jews and Romani people. Those minorities became brutally persecuted, although Budisavljević, mostly thanks to having saved some future Ustasha leaders before the war, evaded persecution himself. His wife, however, was deeply disturbed by the fate of Serb women and children being put in concentration camps and decided to collect and deliver humanitarian aid. Her efforts gained further urgency in June 1942 when a German and Ustasha offensive against Partisans on Mount Kozara in today’s Bosnia resulted in a large number of Serb children ending up in facilities like the notorious Jasenovac Concentration Camp, where thousands quickly succumbed to neglect, starvation and disease. Budisavljević organised a rescue in the form of mass adoption and foster care among Zagreb families, which ultimately saved thousands of lives; her personal connections among the higher ranks of the German military and Catholic Church made this operation possible and offered protection to her and her husband. In May 1945 victorious Partisans entered Zagreb, but the new post-war Communist government failed to recognise Diana Budisavljević’s work and, until recently, her role in those events was virtually unknown.
For Dana Budisavljević, who had made only documentaries until this point, The Diary of Diana B. is her first live-action film and it shows. Obviously inspired by Spielberg’s Schindler’s List, it tries to pay not-so-subtle homage to that film with its use of black-and-white photography. There are, however, few similarities between the two films, partly due to the much lower budget for Budisavljević’s film, which was made as a Croatian-Slovenian-Serbian co-production. Almost all live-action scenes take place indoors – in the Budisavljevićs’ luxurious villa or various offices – and consist of lengthy discussions about the protagonist’s work or the political situation, which serve as exposition for viewers not so familiar with the history of Yugoslavia in WW2. Those scenes are often poorly directed, overlong and uninspired despite some of the actors, like Alma Prica in the title role, trying their best to bring some life to their characters.
The Diary of Diana B. works best in documentary scenes, where the director can apply her rich past experience. This includes authentic documentary footage made in the camps, which is almost seamlessly fused with the rest of the film; those scenes, which feature starved and sick children, many of them actually dying in inhumane conditions, are quite disturbing, and this film should not be recommended to overly sensitive viewers. Equally powerful is the documentary footage made in the present day when four of the rescued children, now people at the twilight of their lives, recall their experiences, horrors they witnessed, and families and loved ones they lost, while one of them struggles with the fact that the loss of Diana Budisavljević’s records deprived him of his proper identity. Those segments of the film make the live-action scenes unnecessary and create the impression that Dana Budisavljević could have made a much better film if she had taken inspiration from Shoah. Although deeply flawed, this film nevertheless serves its purpose by providing an important history lesson, especially needed in these times when such lessons might be forgotten and characters like Diana Budisavljević might be needed again.
RATING: 5/10 (++)
(Note: The text in the original version is available here.)
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