An Exercise In Nonsense

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

This is a tender, generous movie that likes its characters and presents them as real people, full of flaws and strengths.

A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

SKINNING is a cheap-as-chips skinhead drama from Serbia, of all places. Like most skinhead and Neo-Nazi films out there, the protagonist is a youthful innocent who gets drawn into a skinhead crowd and thus a world of violence and hatred. If you like this type of story, I'd recommend checking out the likes of THIS IS ENGLAND instead, as this film won't satisfy. It's cheap and grubby, much like AMERICAN HISTORY X but without the characterisation or depth.

SISANJE is a story of a young Belgrade high school math champ Novica who gets seduced into the world of skinheads by their charismatic leader Relja. Novica joins the gang of racist skinheads in an attempt to overcome the geek status in school but soon enough he is sucked into the world of racism, violence and hooliganism, the skinhead movement takes him over and eventually he starts climbing up the ladder in the skinhead hierarchy. Skinning is a Serbian film that talks about skinheads but unfortunately the whole story it tries to tell is pretty mediocre and the same thing goes for the acting for example Bojana Novakovic who starred alongside Mel Gibson in Edge of Darkness is in this movie and the only thing she does is to screw this guy called Novica our main character unlike films such as American History X that tells a similar story that worked very well in this film we have nothing like that we just have mediocre action, suspense and even sex scenes that feel kinda out of place it tried hard to tell a story and have impact on it's viewers but it failed and i really don't get the point on why this film was released in 3D in Serbia it makes no sense at all. By far the best thing about the movie were the Posters of Terminator 2 and 300 and there's a really good reference to 300 unfortunately the ending completely ruined that reference.

Skinning is a movie about skinheads in Serbia. Even if you haven't been acquainted with skinhead subculture or Serbia it quickly becomes apparent that the authors took a lot of liberties which, in turn, were necessary to create a feature film interesting to broader audience.In this sense, Skinning is a work of fiction although it borrows heavily from reality. It tells a bleak story about rough young people. As it usually is the case, soon the politicians and secret service step in to manipulate them. What i particularly liked is that Skinning never became vulgar nor sought undeserved attention by explicit scenes of sex and violence.Eventually, the actress who caught my attention was Bojana Novakovic. You might also see her deliver an excellent performance in Burning Man (2011) playing next to Matthew Goode.

Some words ahead: If you've never heard from Serbia or have no idea what it is or where it is, your impression of this film will probably be lower. Too many things you need to know prior to understanding all terms used, and to be honest: Who knows the political situation of Serbia then and now? Well, I was lucky enough to have at least a rudimentary knowledge of that so I didn't have to scratch my head the whole time :-)If you leave that aside, you have a solid, dense, exciting and - for that sub-genre (skin-hooligan-drama or whatever you'd call it) - a few quite(!) novel ideas. The acting is - in my humble opinion - very good, the characters are all believable, the story is interesting although a bit short and therefore compressed, but overall very good. All characters are, if not likable, then at least understandable in their actions, which is vital for a drama to work. An open minded viewer assumed, but I guess you're not reading this if you're seeking for another comedy.For a laughable (nowadays *sigh*) budget of 500k it's an excellent work. Hollywood doesn't even manage to release a believable porn-movie with that budget ,-)Also I really liked that no side is taken in a shallow way. You get hit in the face by the quite decent brutality (think of the budget!), the social background and the political system (isn't it the same everywhere anyway?). The placing of real footage for less subtle shocking reasons was well placed and fit well.This was my second Serbian film. The first one being "a Serbian film" I didn't knew if I could expect anything decent. But "Skinning" has class and is a totally serious drama. I would say that I liked this one the most of all these skin/Nazi/hooligan-flicks like "Romper Stomper" or even "Hooligans" or the lesser known works.I usually don't write reviews, but I saw this one hasn't any but it deserves at least one good because of it's comparably low voting. Judge for yourself! If you enjoyed "Hooligans" or anything like that, you'll enjoy this one too. Well at least in the same way you could "enjoy" war-movies, you know what I mean.For your better valuing of this review: I'm German, male, around 40, seen thousands (literally) of movies, like most genres (instead of romance, sport and most comedy) and am getting more demanding in a cinematographically way every year :)And before I forget: If you're into violence but cannot stand naked people: There is at least one quite graphic sex-scene. So maybe skip that one :-)From me, a solid 7,5 with a tendency upwards.