From Real World Friction to Reel World Fiction

“If it weren’t for wars, I would be a rich man,” said Milutin Randjelovic, the only Yugoslavian movie distributor who made it to the International Film Festival here this year.

“I’d have a yacht like that one,” he said, waving his hand toward a mogul’s boat, complete with helicopter, bobbing in the Mediterranean waters.

Randjelovic, owner of Belgrade-based Metro Films, took “Terminator 2” to Yugoslavia seven days before war broke out between Serbia and Croatia in August 1991.

This year, bombs started dropping on Belgrade before he could release a French-language film, “Asterix and Obelix” starring Roberto Benigni.

Yet through nearly a decade of war, political instability and economic chaos, Yugoslavian movie fans have wanted to see the films produced in America, France and other movie centers around the world. So Randjelovic, known as Misko to his friends, persists.

He drove 600 miles from Belgrade to the French Riviera uncertain whether he would buy any films--with theaters closed at night in Yugoslavia, it’s not practical to release new movies.

But after spending a day begging price reductions on films he had bought in March at the American Film Market in Santa Monica, he could no longer resist.

“I must buy something for faith and happiness. If a film is good, people will see it--even during a war,” he said.

He purchased the rights to two films in festival competition, a David Lynch film “The Straight Story” and a Russian film “The Barber of Siberia” for $5,000 each.

It was, he said, an expression of his optimism “that this will be over soon. “ He adds, “Maybe when the war is over, maybe in the fall, we can make a good film business again.”

Ten years ago, Yugoslavia was one of the largest entertainment markets in Eastern Europe. But after a decade of political chaos and rampant piracy of films, the country means scarcely pocket change for the large international film sales companies, surpassed by Poland and the Czech Republic among others. American films remain in demand; “Titanic” was No. 1 at the box office there last year.

Usually half a dozen or more Yugoslav film distributors show up at the world’s major film markets. This year, all but Randjelovic were kept home from Cannes by the combination of economic sanctions and the practical problems associated with trying to distribute movies in a country at war.

Randjelovic had another reason to make the journey from Belgrade. His French wife, Alexandra, and 17-year-old daughter, Marie, had fled to Paris not long after the NATO bombing of Belgrade began March 24. They met him here on Saturday night.

“I wanted to come here and wake up normally and go to the market,” he said. “Enjoy the sun, no bombs.”

Randjelovic, 40, has been in the film distribution business for more than a decade.

He was born into an affluent Belgrade family, the son of a builder. But his life in the Yugoslav entertainment industry has been precarious. A few months before the bombing, he set up a television network of sorts, distributing programming to dozens of local broadcast stations around the country. That and his film distribution effectively stopped when the NATO bombing campaign started. He has let most of his 40 employees go and hopes to get started again after the war.

Randjelovic is an elected member of the Belgrade city government overseeing cultural and social affairs. He also is an active member of a Serbian opposition party headed by Vuk Draskovic, who was thrown out of the national government for criticizing Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic after the bombing.

Of course, Randjelovic opposes the NATO bombing campaign, which he describes as “not a clever thing.” He said he has friends in city government who have been killed and maimed, and one bombing target, a police headquarters, was only a few hundred yards from his home.

“But I have many friends outside the country, so it’s hard for me to hate Americans or French or English,” he said. “Who is guilty for what is happening to us? I blame the government.”

Randjelovic, a stocky man who speaks comfortably in English and French, visits Los Angeles twice a year for film and television markets and remains curious about what’s going on in the business. Passing a billboard for Universal’s picture “EDtv,” he asks, “How did it do?”

After arriving late Saturday and trying unsuccessfully to get tickets for the party thrown by New Line for its “Austin Powers” sequel, Randjelovic spent Sunday and Monday making the rounds of the companies he often works with.

At some stops, he asked whether he could get a reduction in the prices he’d committed to pay for films.

At the Carlton Hotel office of Jacques-Eric Strauss, general manager of President Films, he got a sympathetic response to his request to lower the price from $45,000 to $20,000 for “Asterix,” the story of a Gaulish village in 50 BC that resisted the Roman Empire, thanks to a magic potion.

“I understand your situation,” Strauss said.

Randjelovic also had several meetings trying to help sell international rights to “The Dagger,” a Yugoslavian film based on a novel by Draskovic, the leader of Randjelovic’s political party. It is described as an “epic film about the destiny of a nation, its roots and evil which is following it like a doom through centuries.”

By mid-week, after watching several new films, his spirits were on the rise. “I love this place,” he declared. “Give me any time a beautiful love story, please.”