Welcome To Sarajevo (DVD 2004)

Winterbottom's film is a feast of harrowing imagery sustained by a relentless emotional intensity and convincing performances. For all that, however, it is a film with an agenda that is not simply humanitarian: as such, the film is one-sided, simplistic and two-dimensional. The Tchetnyk scene, for example, is unbelievably unfair, given that ethnic cleansing was anything else but Serbian private property. In his defence, Winterbottom does make gestures in the way of showing the internal wounds of the besieged (gangs, debauchery, corruption), but these gestures are perfunctory and definitely not enough to transcend the naive good Muslim/ bad Serb trajectory of the movie. Politics aside, however, (at the end of the day, there is no way to make a truly impartial film) "Welcome to Sarajevo" is powerful and cogent.