Two Branko’s Kozaras

The film “Two Branko’s Kozaras” was produced by the Genocide Victims’ Museum in Belgrade and is dedicated to the tragic suffering of tens of thousands of innocent members of the Serbian people in the great Croatian-German offensive on Kozara in the summer of 1942. The film was directed by Ivica Vidanović, the screenwriter is Božidar Knežević, and the expert consultant is Bojan Arbutina, curator-historian of the Genocide Victims’ Museum in Belgrade. The project was supported by the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Serbia and the Foundation of the Genocide Victims’ Museum in Belgrade.

Through the fictional story of the old man Branko, who as a boy hid on Kozara from the enemy, and archival footage, the film tells the story of suffering during the pogrom of 1942. Confronting his suffering past and walking through the forests of Kozara, the old Branko recalls his fears and suffering, his childhood and the struggle for life in those merciless times. It is a story about a child who, against his will, ended up in the vortex of the most horrific crimes committed against his people in centuries of history, and a story about the burden he grew up with and carries until his old age.

The film also uses authentic footage from Kozara, which was not shown after World War II. They represent part of the “picture book”, or the journal of the Independent State of Croatia, the original of which is kept in Serbia.

“Branko’s Two Kozaras” rounds off the project of the Museum of Genocide Victims, which included an exhibition dedicated to the Battle of Kozara and the subsequent Kozara epic, a bilingual exhibition catalogue, as well as collections of selected documents and testimonies published in Serbian and translated into English.

In addition to the film screening, a lecture entitled “Kozara 1942” will be given by Nikola Miloševski, curator of the Genocide Victims’ Museum in Belgrade. In the spring of 1942, partisan units fought successfully to expand the free territory, which included several important strategic points and urban and economic centers in the Bosnian Krajina. Prijedor, Ljubija, Oštrelja and Bosanski Petrovac were liberated, while vital communications to the Sava, Vrbas and Sana valleys were constantly threatened. This was reason enough for German and Croatian military forces to launch a large-scale offensive on the strongest partisan stronghold in the Bosnian Krajina on Kozar. During the major German-Croatian offensive from July 10th to 15th, 1942 on Kozara, it is estimated that over 40 thousand Serbs died, of whom about 12 thousand were children under the age of fifteen.