Do You Remember Dolly Bell?

Do You Remember Dolly Bell? (Sjećaš li se, Dolly Bell?, 1981) is a Yugoslav coming-of-age drama you can watch online on iFILM. It marks the feature debut of Emir Kusturica, written by the poet Abdulah Sidran, and it stays among his most tender films.

Early-1960s Sarajevo. Teenage Dino shares a cramped flat with a big family and an idealist father who's dying slowly while still waiting for communism to arrive any day now. Dino, meanwhile, spins his first records, practises hypnosis on a rabbit, and tries to will a brighter future into being by sheer concentration. Then the neighbourhood's petty crooks ask him to hide a young woman, and first love turns up hand in hand with his first grown-up decision.

Everything Kusturica would become is already on screen: sorrow braided with absurdity, music everywhere, the warm chaos of a Balkan courtyard, the ache of a childhood slipping away. The film took the Golden Lion for best first work at the Venice Film Festival. Quiet and disarming, it's for anyone who prefers a distinct European auteur voice over a loud plot. Stream Do You Remember Dolly Bell? (1981) online on iFILM.