Nataša Urban created one of this year’s most visually appealing pieces of cinema with The Eclipse, which grabbed the prestigious CPH:DOX Award from the main competition.
The 2022 CPH:DOX – Copenhagen International Documentary Film Festival has officially crowned its winners with one of our favorite titles taking home the top prize at the festival. This year’s main competition was so diverse, consisting of 12 films from 4 continents and presenting 6 world premieres; The Fall (Andreas Koefoed), Holidays (Antonie Cattin), Outside (Olha Zhurba), Into the Ice (Lars Ostenfeld), Girl Gang (Susanne Regina Meures) and The Eclipse (Nataša Urban). The latter, which gives us a personal look at the director’s origin is a rich and beautifully made film about ex-Yugoslavia.
After having previously worked with co-director Lucian Muntean on “Journey to a Red Fridge”, “Big Sister Punam”, and “Mbambu and the Mountains of the Moon”, in her first solo length documentary, director Nataša Urban used the solar eclipse phenomenon of 1999 as her mirror image to which she travels back to present-day Yugoslavia, the country where Urban was born, to collect stories from family members and acquaintances after she found her dad’s mountaineering logbook, which he kept for over 30 years. Facing the demons of the past has been very difficult but so important. The exiled director turns her camera and uses the rare natural phenomenon as a motif in her cinematic form of her country’s dark past. At that time, while Europe was engrossed in the total solar eclipse, which momentarily enveloped the earth in darkness, most of Serbia’s population was busy barricading themselves in their homes and shelters in the fear of the total solar eclipse.
With its existential work of imagery and innovative storytelling, lush and lovely cinematography shot on analogue 16mm, Urban creates one of this year’s most visually appealing pieces of cinema. The story may be revolving around wartimes and the criminal past of former Yugoslavia, recreating a haunting imagination about a nation’s unclean conscience about the consequences of its political choices that are still lurking on her mind today but this documentary absolutely is woven from memories. Urban successfully explored the pain, with a gentle touch on her childhood memories. The film uses a great example of natural light accentuating both interior and exterior shots, and successfully transporting us to a world decades ago. The result is hypnotic as it is truly haunting and shattering but on the other side, this is also delightful just like grandma’s pantry.
Overall, The Eclipse (Formørkelsen) is a big step for director Nataša Urban for its grand, unique, and timeless fashioned style. This extraordinary work serves up a series of stunning aesthetic forms and uses the artifice of filmmaking to expose wounds of war and the trauma of a nation.
