Prostor doma u hrvatskim igranim filmovima s temom domovinskog rata
Authors:   , Lacko Tatjana 
Published: October 2024

The dissertation explores the formation of domestic space in contemporary Croatian society through its presentations in the medium of feature films. The cinematic domestic spaces are understood as heterotopic spaces, reflections of real spaces, and are considered like any other socially produced and constructed living spaces in which meanings are continuously reinterpreted and negotiated depending on changes in the perception and representation of social reality. Taking into account dwelling as a polylocal and multilevel continuous process, the analysis of home-making is approached from several perspectives. Firstly, there is an examination of notions of home as a place of protection and security, a place of belonging, and a place of identity formation. Secondly, there is an analysis of the processes of emplacement, spatialization, and objectification of conceptions in specific physical locations, objects, and things. Thirdly, the ways in which societies and cultures are reflected in everyday, periodic, and ritual household practices are explored. Fourthly, a set of affects and feelings related to the interrelationship between the space of the home, its inhabitants, and external factors is detected. Fifthly, dwelling is considered through the influence of domestic space on the construction of other living spaces and the broader range of homeland. The home making is affected by the contentious circumstances of wartime and post-war living, thus the film material encompasses Croatian feature films with themes related to the Croatian War of Independence (1991-1995) produced from the period of Croatia's independence almost until today (1991-2023). Ethnographic qualitative methods of visual analysis and thick description of film material are used to identify materialistic, performative, and affective manifestations of conceptions about home and dwelling in the spatiotemporal context of the production of each film. Through the analysis and synthesis of research results, the meanings attributed to the space of the home and dwelling in Croatian contemporaneity are defined, as well as the dialectical processes of inscribing real spaces into the film narrative, as well as into the maps of social memory related to the construction of home. After the introductory discussion defining the theoretical framework, hypotheses, and research objectives, the second chapter delves into the filmological and cultural anthropological premises of the creation of cinematic domestic space. It elaborates on the filmological understanding of cinematic domestic space as one of the fundamental factors contributing to the resemblance of the cinematic world to the real one, resulting in viewers' recognition and identification with fiction. On the other hand, it presents a cultural anthropological perspective that defines cinematic domestic spaces as social products and constructs that take on characteristics of the real world to which they refer. Drawing on the anthropology of space and place and social memory, cinematic domestic space is defined as heterotopic make-believe space in which film narratives are continuously inscribing meanings as well as the social environment that created them, forming the basis for the construction of social memory related to concepts of home and dwelling. The comprehensive chapter on theoretical approaches is dedicated to the conceptualization of domestic space. It presents key theoretical approaches to the space and place of the home, starting from classical ethnological and cultural anthropological research on home space as a kind of "container," through the reinterpretation of the theme of home in postmodern criticism to more recent research. It explores the sequence of five dominant research perspectives, each focusing on a specific aspect of dwelling, upon which this research is also based. Therefore, the chapter is divided into five sections identifying the key concepts related to understanding the dialectical relationship between residents and home: (1) ideas of home, (2) materialization, (3) dwelling practices, (4) emotionalization of domestic space, and (5) measures and scopes of home. The third chapter contains the basic principles of the methodological approach to film analysis. The relationship between domestic space and inhabitants is understood as a process in which individuals and communities continuously inscribe meanings into places, assuming that what is inscribed in space can be read from space. Therefore, the chapter presents a method of reading cinematic domestic spaces as thick description based on qualitative visual analysis of film images, content analysis, pattern detection, and visual anthropology, i.e., comparative analysis and synthesis in the form of ethnographic writing. The second part interprets the ethnographic inside-outside position of the researcher, who is firstly an architect and production designer involved in designing of the cinematic space, and secondly, an ethnologist and cultural anthropologist engaged in researching home-making. In the fifth chapter, the circumstances of the emergence of the new Croatian cinema (following the independence of the Republic of Croatia after the dissolution of the SFR Yugoslavia in 1991) are outlined, along with the factors that influenced Croatian film authors' focus on themes of home and the War of Independence (1991-1995). The second part interprets the process of film selection by detecting the interrelationship between home and the War of Independence in each individual film. The following five chapters present ethnographic descriptions of the research, namely the analysis of cinematic domestic space as depicted in selected feature films, through five research perspectives. The first section encompasses the cinematic representations of home in the context of wartime living through three perspectives: (1) home as a place of protection and security, (2) home as a place of belonging, and (3) home as a place of identity-making. In the first section, the ways in which the home space protects its inhabitants are examined, as well as the ways in which the inhabitants protect their home, with a particular focus on the vulnerabilities and porousness of the home in wartime conditions. In the second section related to the concept of belonging of inhabitants to the space and place of the home is explored, as well as the belonging of inhabitants to the community, shared values, and way of life. Belonging to the home is discussed through horizontal and vertical connections, processes of rooting, disputes related to claiming rights to a particular territory, and themes of eviction of inhabitants from their homes. The third section deals with the dialectical relationship between the identities of the inhabitants and the identities of the home. The type of the identity of dwelling developed in wartime conditions is discussed, especially among soldiers, as well as the themes of individual emancipation and/or resistance to social norms. The second research section focuses on the materialization of the home through the investigation of cinematic emplacement, spatialization, and objectification of the notion of home. Firstly, it examines how the selected location of the home reflects the film's inhabitants and their way of life, as well as the idea of the film's narrative. Including themes such as naming or the ways in which the actual location is inscribed into the film narrative are explored, as well as how the film is inscribed into real spaces. Through analyses of the type of houses, architectural elements, rooms, and liminal zones, it is determined how the design of physical space reveals the characters, their biographies, and their relationships with others. Special attention in this chapter is devoted to objects, both those that represent the background of the plot describing the social and cultural context of dwelling, and those that serve as objects of identification in the cinematic narrative, triggers of action, or vectors of memory of people, places, and events from the past. The third research section turns to the consideration of home as a process. It analyzes the construction of home through everyday household practices, such as dining or maintaining cleanliness of the home and its inhabitants, observed in the extreme circumstances of war. Forms of wartime living characterized as the "new normal" are identified, aiming to reveal the adaptability of the home space and its inhabitants to changes. Special attention is given to the practice of watching television as a factor in family gathering. The second part of this section deals with commemorative practices as the most common ones in wartime circumstances, as well as the significance that inhabitants attribute to the place and ritual of burial. The fourth section comprises a group of themes related to the complex set of feelings that inhabitants develop in, towards, and about the home, as well as towards other household members. Firstly, it examines the ways in which affective states of being-at-home are depicted in films, with a special focus on privacy, solidarity, comfort, and love. In the second part of this section, the methods by which filmmakers create a specific atmosphere of the home space to achieve a certain planned impression are discussed, with the scolar drawing on personal experience working on some of the analyzed films. The third part analyzes circumstances in which the affect of being-at-home takes on negative, unhomely values. At the end of the chapter, questions regarding social and personal memories embedded in cinematic narratives are raised. Additionally, the section explores the film medium as a vector of memory of recent Croatian history, as well as the role of cinematic storytelling in the politics of memory. In the final research section, the theme of different measures and scopes of home is opened through the concept of polylocal dwelling, which is examined through four different manifestations of home. In the first part, heterotopic manifestations of home, such as refugee or military housing, are analyzed with the aim of detecting the interactions between the primary home and all other places of residence. The second part discusses cinematic depictions of utopian places of dwelling, such as cemeteries as eternal resting places and sacred objects as the dwelling place of God, in terms of understanding dwelling as a conception beyond existing reality. In the third part, cinematic depictions of the primary home and the home of the Other are compared, conceptualized in the analyzed films either as the enemy's home or as a home located beyond the reach of war. In the final research section, the concept of homeland is discussed, including the ways in which notions of home are reflected, manifested, constructed, and felt on a broader scale, taking into account wartime and post-war circumstances. In the conclusion of the research, through comparative analysis and synthesis, the research results are presented as a "picture of home" in the spatiotemporal social and cultural context of the creation of the film work, detecting changes in meanings and circumstances of dwelling in Croatian contemporaneity over a period of almost thirty years.