The Blockade

BLOKADA trailer from FACTUM documentary on Vimeo.

The Blockade is the author's depiction of the most massive, longest and politically the most important student protests in this country – the blockade of the Zagreb Faculty of Philosophy in April and May 2009. The film chronologically documents the preparatory meetings of a group of students planning to occupy the building of their faculty for a day in order to raise public awareness of the problems concerning the right to free university education in Croatia. The film depicts the taking of the building and the attempts to establish a dialogue with the authorities (professors, Croatian government members and media). Very soon, the blockade outgrows its protagonists and it spreads across the country, to another twenty or so faculties. It lasts 34 days and makes headlines in Croatian media. The film follows the protagonists' lives after the blockade, their conflicts, their uncompromising fight and, finally, their decision to end the blockade and continue their fight using other means.

Since the author was part of the initiative and since the film crew functioned as insider documenters of the 'independent initiative for free education', they recorded literally everything that is relevant for a thorough and comprehensive depiction of the events in which students, for the first time after 1971, became key subjects in the political life of Croatia and the surrounding region. Given the fact that the whole film crew was actively involved in the events, the film is a collective project of numerous students involved in the fight for free education.