Chronicle's Bibliotheque

Dražen

A biographical recollection on the late film critic Dražen Movre.

Born in Zagreb, the late film critic Dražen Movre (Zagreb 7 II 1944. Zagreb, 12 IX 1997) have spent almost half of his life in other parts of ex Yugoslavia (in Belgrade and in a small town Đ urđevac). His father was a judge, and they moved as the fortunes of his career required. Though Movre’s early and successful interest in chess continued throughout his life, the preoccupation with film became the main one when it was raised in teens, through regular attendance of film shows, and active photographic activity with his friend. Graduating the Faculty of political sciences in Zagreb, Movre got the job as radio journalist in Croatian town Bjelovar (1968/1972), then in Osijek (1972/1976), and finally in Zagreb (from 1976 on; from 1990 being an editor there).

Besides doing journalist job for radio, he organized several cinema clubs, published film reviews and essays in several papers, and later on became a professional film critic on Radio Zagreb, writing also for film magazine Kinoteka and lately for cultural biweekly Vijenac. His interest in film was simultaneous with the rise of »auteur cinema« in ex-Yugoslavia, and though Movre was open to the classical and commercial cinema, modernist and postmodernist art-film and Croatian auteur films were at the core of his film affinities. Being unimposing, writing only small pieces (most of them lost in the air — Movre did not save the manuscripts of his broadcasted pieces), the subtle stylistic value of his writing, his witty observations and tolerant but unrelenting judgements have passed almost unnoticed.

Petar Krelja