"...If there was another film that could be paired with Makhmalbaf's, it was not in the main competition. Of the films that I could see beyond that (too) large section (22 films), Awakening of the Dead (Budjenje iz mrtvih) by veteran Serbian Director Milos "Misa" Radivojevic stood out strongly as one of the big films of Serge Losique's festival. Radivojevic's film had its American premiere here (it had been shown previously only in its country of origin and in the Sarajevo film festival, and this was the reason it could not be in this official competition). Awakening of the Dead is a dark, almost sick film. It's set in 1999 (while Belgrade is being bombed), and the main character is a Serbian professor, married and saddled with a kid, an aging father, and the unbearable burden of recent Serbian history. If you are thinking of a film made in the latest Kusturica style, full of music and colors and music and noise and "funny characters" and shouts and more noise and confusion (for this kind of proposition, there was a Serbian film in the competition, the annoying Go West), let me tell you that you will be surprised. The atmosphere here is terribly gloomy; the tone is serious, but not solemn at all (there are moments of black humor). Awakening of the Dead is a journey into hell, a nightmarish travel into the heart of darkness: history meets individuals' personal memories and moral decisions, and the results are devastating.