The magnificent composition of the vistas captured by cinematographer Mladen Teofilovic will pull the air right out of your lungs. Right from the opening ransacking of the old house, there is a creeping devastation set up that can be felt on the back of your neck. Sun Never Again presents lives being torn apart piece by piece, with matching imagery of the ripped apart houses and the ripped open face of the mountain.
There is a potent visual motif that Jovanovic uses where the landscape of the iron mining has an iris with a different image placed in front of it, like a silent movie. The figure or figures in the iris image are framed by the spirals in the rock from blasting, making sure that the commercial degradation of the area is always omnipresent. The mine disappears from the final epic iris shot, leaving a black field to frame one of the most unique final images I have ever seen in a film. It combines all of the extremes of the elements used in the narrative, from the high-flying fantasy to the grit-swallowing reality.
“…shines brightly through its bleakness in the way only great cinema can.”
The music is amazing as well, with an original score by Nemanja Mosurovic that is so fresh it still has a placenta attached to it. I am always eager to hear innovations for background music, and Mosurovic is working in much further territory than others. The song selection is outstanding as well, from the traditional folk songs to a tune by David Lynch called “Sun Can’t Be Seen No More.” Add in the haunting sound design by Antonio Andric, and you have a sonic wingspan that carries the strong screen images flapping above the moon. You won’t need any special background knowledge on the situation in Serbia that Jovanovic is highlighting to understand or appreciate what is going on.
While the film does serve to bring attention to a real-life injustice, Sun Never Again hits several universal pressure points for audience identification. Almost everyone around the world is currently on the receiving end of some raw deal that is too huge to free themselves from. Seeing a movie with people in really dead-end places reacting to approaching disaster is invigorating as f**k. Jovanovic captures the exact shade of dire that the world is painted in right now, and it is great to see it onscreen. This is also a good study on resistance, be it resistance to change or resistance to injustice, and how complicated it can be when the two mix.
Sun Never Again is a towering mirror of doom that goes up a mile high in its defiance in the face of destruction. Even with all the great movies we have had recently, this is definitely one of the best films of the year.
"…definitely one of the best films of the year."
