Narava Beso
The point of reference in Iztok Kovac`s work is often his home town Trbovlje – a mining town and at the same time the Slovene simbol of gray, polluted and forsaken landscape of socialist heavy industry. His returns to his home-town should not be understood merely as nostalgia or personal sentimentality, but as a return to the source of his own physical constitution, which was formed when surrounded by the bodies of workers and miners, in the alternating rhytm of work and rest, in the enviromnent constantly reminding one of the irreconciable conflict between civilization and nature.
Thus his film Narava Beso reveals, on one hand, his personal attitude towards the realistic ambient of his home-town and on the other, enriched with wider connotations and forming itself into a certain poetical structure, his understanding of the actual world.
The film takes place on seven different locations, having in common, that somewhere in past in time of somebody`s youth, somebody`s childhood, in time of a different social climate and past stage of human history they were the places, where hard physical work took place. And suddenly this site, marked with activity, which had stopped due to certain historical necessity, is taken by a group of dancers. Yet, suprisingly, they do not move. Instead they are just listening to the far away sounds and rhythms. But if or when decide to move again, they move carefully and thoughtfully, as following the complex energetic currents, encoded in this grounds. (Eda Čufer)
Premiere: 13/12/1995
Slovenska kinoteka, Ljubljana
Credits
concept and choreography
Iztok Kovač
directed and edited by
Patrick Otten
Iztok Kovač
performed by
Maja Delak
Eva-Maria Michel
Rebecca Murgi
Juho Saarinen
Carmelo Scarcella
Iztok Kovač
violin
Eva-Maria Michel
director of photography
Patrick Otten
sound composition
Charo Calvo
sound recording
Hanna Preuss-Slak
costumes
Isabelle Lhoas
camera assistent
Jasenko Rasol
chief electrician
Francis Gahide
script girl
Varja Močnik
boom operator
Simon Obleščak
key grip
Viba Film
location manager
Janez Kovač
still photography
Antonio Živkovič
off-line editing
Joris Hengebaert
on-line editing
Eric Van De Sype
sound technician
Desiree Helgesen
climbing instructors
Metka Lukančič
Vili Guček
production coordination
STUC
Studio MI
postproduction facilities
BRTN
executive producer
Mateja Podmenik
co-producers
TV Slovenia
BRTN
production
EN-KNAP
With financial support from the Ministry of Culture and the Municipality of Ljubljana - Department for Culture.
