The history of the Croatian Film Association and the history of Croatian amateur cinema

1928 – 1935

At the height of the global amateur film movement, Maksimilijan Paspa founded a film section within the Zagreb Photo Club in 1928. Its members were primarily from the upper middle class, who could afford the necessary film equipment. Alongside Paspa and Oktavijan Miletić, notable members of the club included Oto Almasy, Vladimir Cizelj, Viktor Czerny, Tošo Dabac, Aurel Gorjan, Ljudevit Griesbach, Ignjat Habermüller, Dr. Alfred Leitner, Zlatko Lippa, M. Marković, Ivan Paspa, Leon Paspa, Karlo Peharec, Franjo Schwarzwald, Dr. Žiga Spitzer, Đuro Vojvodić, among others.

Amateurs from Yugoslavia participated in many international events. The most successful were O. Miletić (awards in Berlin in 1931 and Paris in 1933) and M. Paspa (awards in Amsterdam in 1932, London in 1933, and Barcelona in 1935). In April 1934, the first amateur film festival in Yugoslavia was held in Zagreb, followed in November 1935 by the first festival of international significance — the Pan-Slavic Amateur Film Festival.
In 1935, the film section became independent and formed a separate club (Zagreb Film Club), expanding its membership. The section/club also occasionally organized lectures on technical matters and the artistic aspects of film.

1936 – 1945

Members of Kinoklub Zagreb (Miletić and Paspa) participated in the 1936 Venice Biennale of Cinematic Art. During this time, they also achieved notable success in other European cities — Paspa with documentaries and Miletić with fiction films (Faust, Nocturno, The Affairs of Consul Diogenes), confirming his status as the most important Croatian filmmaker of the 1930s, a title he maintained into the 1940s with his feature film Lisinski (1944).

Amateur filmmakers also emerged in other cities: Ivan Tićak, Boris Pajkurić, and Milan Dilny in Rijeka; Dinko Mrkonjić, Vinko Marojević, and Ante Benzon in Split; Josip Vaništa in Karlovac; Branko Zimerman in Virovitica; and Vladislav Ilin in Novi Sad. Around 1936, another club was founded in Zagreb — the Amateur Film Society Romanija. Its members would later become prominent film professionals across various audiovisual fields: comic artists, animators, directors (Walter and Norbert Neugebauer); directors, screenwriters, and educators (Krešo Golik, Nikola Tanhofer); TV and radio host/director Ivan Hetrich; and actor Sven Lasta.
During World War II (1941–1945) and the fascist regime of the puppet Independent State of Croatia, film production was state-organized and encouraged. Prominent amateurs continued working, producing professional documentaries, educational films, and war newsreels. Some secretly collaborated with the Partisan movement.

1946 – 1953

After the establishment of socialist Yugoslavia, the pre-war amateur film organizations temporarily ceased operations. However, amateur filmmaking soon began to revive through the formation of new clubs as part of a state campaign to "bring technology closer to the people." In 1946, the Rijeka Photo and Film Club was founded, followed by Kino-klub Split in 1952 and the re-establishment of Kinoklub Zagreb in 1953. The clubs focused on amateur film production, along with regular film courses, screenings, and discussions.

1955 ‒ 1960

In 1955, Ljerka Smrček founded the first children’s film club in Zagreb’s Pioneer Town. By 1957, Kinoklub “Slavica” was active in Pitomača under Mirko Lauš, achieving unparalleled success in Croatian children's film both domestically and abroad. Children's filmmaking expanded nationwide, with about twenty clubs active during this period.

While the amateur film system focused on mass technical culture, the second half of the 1950s saw the emergence of authors in clubs like Kinoklub Zagreb, Split, and Osijek who explored film as a medium for personal expression (Mihovil Pansini, Tomislav Gotovac, Vladimir Petek, Ivan Martinac, and others). Clubs became creative hubs for students and intellectuals wishing to experiment with unconventional film styles. Local, republic-level, and national festivals of amateur film began spreading across Yugoslavia.

1960s

Reacting to the artistic ferment of the 1950s and new "anti-" tendencies in the arts, Kinoklub Zagreb members in the early 1960s made films identified in 1962–63 discussions as the first "anti-films." These movements culminated in the 1963 founding of GEFF (Genre Film Festival), a biennial event for experimental filmmakers with an interdisciplinary program, gathering film researchers from Yugoslavia and abroad. Four GEFFs were held: 1963, 1965, 1967, and 1970.

That same year, the Croatian Film Association (HFS) was formed as the umbrella organization for amateur film clubs in Croatia — the only such association in Yugoslavia to survive its dissolution and the post-Yugoslav transition.
In 1965, as a prelude to the Pula Film Festival, the first Interclub Amateur Film Festival (MAFAF) was held in Pula by the “Jelen” Film Club. Until its end in 1990, MAFAF remained the largest amateur film event in Yugoslavia.

1970s

With a generational shift and the decline of the amateur film movement that peaked in the 1960s, the 1970s saw experimental film move into the visual arts and galleries (Mladen Stilinović, Želimir Kipke, Ivan Ladislav Galeta, Ivan Faktor), and the emergence of a new medium — video. Early video works emerged in workshops in Yugoslavia and abroad, with young visual artists (Goran Trbuljak, Braco Dimitrijević, Dalibor Martinis, Sanja Iveković) exploring video as a new artistic tool.

Existing clubs continued with reduced intensity. New authors appeared in cities like Rijeka (Luković and Trinajstić) and Osijek (Faktor and Dozet). New initiatives attempted to revive GEFF's experimental spirit, such as Zagreb Film Days (ZAGFIDA, 1974), Petek’s FAVIT (Film, Audiovisual Research, Television, 1979), and the Alternative Film Assembly in Split (1977–1987).
In 1974, HFS began archiving and restoring amateur films, creating a film archive that today houses about 1,000 analogue titles and around 4,000 video works, including works by the renowned Čakovec School of Animated Film (founded in 1975).

1980s

Despite increasing availability of new video technology, film clubs largely remained loyal to celluloid film. A notable body of work in this period came from the so-called “fourth generation” of the Split Film Club (Batinović, Fradelić, Karabatić, Mustać, Poljak, and others), as well as individual members of the Zagreb Film Club. By the late 1980s, with the growing economic crisis affecting amateur film production, video technology began entering clubs. Electronics and videotape started to supplant analog formats, setting the stage for the dominance of digital media in the following decade.

1990s

In 1991, Croatia declared independence, triggering aggression from the Yugoslav army and Serbian forces, leading to the collapse of film production and cinema activities nationwide. HFS responded proactively — founding and supporting new clubs (e.g., FFV Author Studio), organizing amateur film festivals, co-organizing new festivals (Days of Croatian Film, International Festival of New Film and Video in Split, One-Minute Film Festival in Požega), publishing Croatian Film Chronicle and launching its own journal Zapis, updating the film and video archive, transferring films to video, distributing archive films globally in retrospective programs, and participating in UNICA festivals.

Toward the decade's end, the former Summer Film School was renewed as the School of Media Culture (today named after Ante Peterlić). A new wave of independent and club filmmakers (Bogojević Narath, Bukovac, Knežević, Kožul, Kuduz, Mezak, B. Narath, Raos, A. Šimičić, Zrnić, etc.) emerged, embracing video to continue experimenting with electronic formats.

2000s

Thanks largely to the long-term efforts of HFS secretary Vera Robić Škarica, the Croatian Film Association began to operate more like a film institute in the early 21st century. In 2000, it revived professional short film production with notable success (winning major awards at Croatian Film Days and the Pula Film Festival), and simultaneously launched a publishing program that includes magazines, books, film publications, and DVDs. Over time, HFS became the country’s leading film literature publisher. With traditional repertory cinema in decline and domestic cinema networks in disrepair, HFS has since 2003 continuously organized film screenings of classic and art cinema at Tuškanac Cinema, which became its new headquarters. It also initiated and co-organized campaigns (e.g., “Give Me a Cinema!”) to save and revitalize other local cinemas in Croatia.

Archival films are being digitized, restored, distributed, and screened in prestigious cultural centers worldwide — from the Centre Pompidou in Paris and Tate Modern in London to MoMA and Anthology Film Archives in New York. Educational projects have expanded across all age groups: specialized workshops, seminars, in-cinema and online film education, and media literacy programs. HFS supports the establishment of new film clubs and youth film groups by providing logistical, organizational, and technical assistance, as well as helping to launch new festivals and showcases for children and youth. Despite working under emergency conditions due to damage to Tuškanac Cinema in the earthquake, HFS has continued to rebuild its technical and human resources. In its 62nd year, at the end of the first quarter of the new millennium, the association brings together 39 member organizations across the audiovisual field.

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