A tight, realistic drama on the absurdity of war

Rating: 8/10 (29 November 2001)

'No Man's Land' puts the audience smack in the middle of an absurdly realistic situation in the middle of Bosnian/Serb conflict.
Despite the director's self-avowedly "100% pro-Bosnian" sentiments (he is a native Bosnian who shot documentary footage for the Bosnian army during the war), the film manages to rise above an overtly partisan stance to address the ultimately cruel absurdity of war in particular, and human conflict in general. A long list of classic films have blazed this trail: 'All Quiet on the Western Front,' 'Catch-22,' and 'MASH' come immediately to mind.
Yet 'No Man's Land' successfully sidesteps the easy genre cliche. The story, the performances, and the setting are all convincingly, even grippingly real, but carry the haunting resonance of a Greek drama.