ANTE BABAJA (1927-2010) (II)

Writing yourself with a gaze: Good Morning by Ante Babaja

Starting with her personal relation to Babaja as an author of the intimate documentary Good Morning (2007), the author explains the role of the director’s first, and at the same time the last autobiographical film. She explains the manner in which Babaja’s earlier preoccupations (for example, the transience of the body, or as Ante Peterlić put it, "the accidentality of emergence and disappearance") come together in this distinctive piece of work. Good Morning makes use of the fragments from director’s earlier films so as to define the position of its protagonist, Babaja himself, who, with the help of his younger colleagues, learns how to use the electronic camera. The author explores Babaja’s early works, explaining the manner in which he tackled relation to death and other Babaja themes. However, as it is emphasized in the text, this director is the master of a form that strongly draws viewers inside its intellectual (not emotional!) interior so his films can be perceived as a coherent essay on life and death which was started long time ago and has finished only recently.

Diana Nenadić