THE OLD SCHOOL OF CAPITALISM

“Capitalism is defined as an economic system (and social order) in which the greater proportion of economic life, particularly ownership of and investment in production goods, is carried on under private, i.e. non-governmental, auspices through the process of economic competition and the avowed incentive of profit.” (Standard Dictionary of the Political Sciences) The film splices acted scenes together with documentary footage of strikes held in Belgrade over the past few years. An industrialist who refuses to pay his workers’ wages is kidnapped by a group of anarchists. But the hostage-taking fails to achieve its object. What does global capitalism mean for a country that has only begun to play the unfair “game”? With shrewdly analytical humour, the film also poses the question: What do people learn in the “old school of capitalism”? One worker shown in the film coolly remarks, “If you don’t fight, you won’t get anything” With a mixture of playful irony and Marxist gravity, the director addresses the return of feudalistic practices in a country of which the economy is afflicted by factory closures and mass redundancies. The fact that the protagonists from the documentary footage re-appear in their own characters in the film’s acted scenes is very characteristic of the distinctive Želimir Žilnik style.