In Praise of Nothing

Boris Mitić worked for no less than eight years on his ode to Nothing. It is his cinematic equivalent of Erasmus’ humanistic satire In Praise of Folly (1509), in which the goddess Folly travels around the world arguing that it is wiser to be mad than to be wise.

Five hundred years later, Mitić gives the same opportunity to Nothing, who runs away from home and heads out into the world. Nothing sees the world passing by in all its beauty and sadness: a colorful field of flowers, riot police playing in the snow, a sullen horse on a garbage heap, a square thick with tear gas and protestors. Before long, Nothing begins to show human traits and becomes as confused as we are, but gradually he manages to understand human nature.

Nothing’s observations come to us in rhyme, in the wonderfully gravelly voice of punk rock legend Iggy Pop. Director Mitić compiled the images from a vast database of snapshots and film clips made by 62 filmmakers in 70 countries. The intertitles and the music by Pascal Comelade and The Tiger Lillies give Nothing’s quest a pleasing cabaret feeling.