According to Jäckel, "An Unforgettable Summer" has a prophetic role to play within the Balkan context, one she equates with that of Jean-Luc Godard's "La Chinoise", which is credited by others with having offered a glimpse into the French revolutionary environment that was to be responsible for the May 1968 events. Writing shortly after the film's release, John Simon specifically linked the plot with the 1992–95 civil war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, proposing that "it may even explain" what had sparked this conflict; likewise, American critic J. Hoberman places the film's production in the context of the "rebalkanized Balkans".