Darkness There and Nothing More

Filmmaker Tea Tupajic was seven years old when the civil war in the former Yugoslavia reached her hometown Sarajevo. The scars the war left play a major role in her work as an artist. She asked Dutch war veterans Frank and Harm to spend a night in conversation with her. The empty theater gradually darkens. Tupajic wants answers to some painful questions, but she also tries to discover something in the two men that can give her hope.

A woman, a man, and a camera: through this simple set-up, Darkness There and Nothing More concentrates all attention onto the words, gestures, and acts in these two meetings, often captured in tightly framed shots. Despite a shared longing for some kind of deliverance, the frames show a dialog between two worlds that simply won’t combine. Harm carries a huge sense of guilt, while Frank is entirely locked off from his emotions. Tupajic tries to explain that none of her family and friends, despite being alive, really survived the war. Are they ever going to understand each other’s grief?

Nominated for the IDFA Award for Best First Feature and the IDFA Award for Best Dutch Film