Đorđe Kadijević obituary: leading director of Serbian horror and the radical Black Wave movement
The Serbian director – who has died aged 93 – transformed film language as a key figure of the Yugoslav Black Wave during the 1960s, made the country’s first horror and brought remarkable versatility to decades of work across film, television and drama.
“People think that life begins and ends in darkness, but I know that it begins and ends in light.” These words, uttered by the eponymous heroine of Maria (1976), may be a testament to the life and work of its director Đorđe Kadijević, until recently one of the last living ‘old masters’ of the cinema. From Šibenik to Belgrade, Kadijević’s childhood was marked by ethnic persecution, wartime experience and the loss of his father, as recounted by the director in Đorđe Milosavljević Gera’s recent documentary Oflag XIII-B (2023). Even after he obtained his PhD in art history and turned to cinema, Kadijević never shied away from documenting the dark side of human experience, though always with an existential breadth and extraordinary poetic eye.
Combining sociopolitical critique and formal innovation, the Yugoslav Black Wave introduced more radical filmmaking from the 1960s and also included directors Aleksandar Petrović, Dušan Makavejev, Živojin Pavlović and Želimir Žilnik. Kadijević’s debut The Feast (Praznik, 1967), rediscovered at this author’s retrospective at MoMA, is one of the movement’s most representative films, which rethinks human power, responsibility and faith through the story of a Serbian village on Christmas Day, 1943. The film focuses on neglected if not taboo aspects of war, history and the experience of marginal communities. Similar concerns run in The Trek (Pohod, 1968), a powerful rural drama in which a farmer trying to protect his calf amid the inferno of war becomes a metaphor for the preservation of the soul. With a state clampdown on the Black Wave on the horizon, and unable to complete his trilogy – though traces of this legacy would persist in later films such as Žarki (1970) and The Colonel’s Wife (Pukovnikovica, 1972) – Kadijević turned to television.
The director would spend over 20 years with Radio-Television Belgrade (today Radio-Television of Serbia) where he directed many features, documentaries and television series. Widely acclaimed as the first Yugoslav horror film, The She-Butterfly (Leptirica, 1973) combines Slavic mythology, folk horror and film fantastique to portray the Serbian vampire; bearing comparison to films by Sergei Parajanov and Jaromil Jireš, it has also been a source of inspiration, including to Robert Eggers. Other titles from Kadijević’s string of horrors include The Gifts of My Cousin Maria (1969), Ward (1973), The Maiden’s Tune (1973) and the gothic Viy adaptation A Holy Place (1990).
Kadijević’s most significant achievement in historical filmmaking on TV came with Vuk Karadžić (1987 to 1988), an anthology series depicting the life of the famous Serbian linguist and transcriber of Serbian oral tradition, on the occasion of his bicentenary. The series won the Grand Prix of Europe in Rome and earned its director – together with screenwriter Milovan Vitezović – recognition from UNESCO on the recommendation of Umberto Eco.
Frequent collaborators of the director include noted writers Filip David and Milovan Vitezović, cinematographer Aleksandar Petković, actors Jovan Janićijević Burduš and Slobodan Perović, and leading ladies of Yugoslav cinema Mirjana Nikolić, Milena Dravić, Olivera Katarina, Ljerka Draženović and Neda Spasojević. His films were often adapted from literature spanning Serbian epic poetry, realist prose, short stories and modernist writing and frequently produced by nonpartisan, filmmaker-run studios and ciné-clubs including Kino Klub Belgrade, Kino Klub Pančevo and Film Danas. Whether treating historical realism or metaphysical horror, in monochrome or colour, Kadijević’s films are visual poems, minimalist and ascetic, yet overflowing with his distinctive spirit of innovation and discovery: full of dynamic camerawork, non-linear montage and a thoroughly avant-garde sensibility.
This author had the pleasure of knowing the director and his warm humanity. He answered questions openly, spoke at length about his love of cinema and plans for new projects, including an unrealised film on the 1999 NATO bombing of Yugoslavia. He drew great inspiration from Fyodor Dostoevsky, insisting it was important to read his work in its entirety several times over the course of one’s lifetime. He was just beginning again. In that spirit, may each of us who encounter Đorđe Kadijević, whether for the first or 100th time, be enlightened anew and recognise through his works the gifts he truly had: the eye of a Gogol and heart of a Monet.
- Đorđe Kadijević, 6 January 1933 to 10 July 2026