Cinema of flames: Balkan film, culture and the media

The breakup of Yugoslavia triggered a truly international filmmaking project. Underground, Ulysses' Gaze, Before the Rain, Pretty Village, Pretty Flame and Welcome to Sarajevo were among a host of films created as the conflicts in the region unraveled. These conflicts restored the Balkans as a centrepiece of western imagery, and the media (especially cinema) assumed a leading but ambiguous role in defining the region for global consumption through a narrow range of selectively defined images. Simultaneously, much of the high-quality cinematic and television work made in the area (much of it discussed in this book) remains relatively unknown.
Cinema of Flames attempts to go deeper than the imagery and address some of the general concerns of the cross-cultural representation and self-representation of the Balkans. Narrative strategies within the context of Balkan exclusion from the European cultural sphere, the cosmopolitan image of Sarajevo, diaspora, and the representations of villains, victims, women, and ethnic minorities are all considered in the general context of Balkan cinema.