Celebración

Mijo watches over his own home from deep within a forest in the remote Croatian region of Lika. By day, he blends into the undergrowth; at nightfall, his wife brings him the necessary sustenance and news of his family, torn apart by the war. After the Second World War, patrols in the valley search barns and haylofts. Marshal Tito's new Yugoslavia is looking for the defeated fascists whom, like Mijo, the forest refuses to surrender. In the empty hours, his memory drifts back to his childhood. Specifically, the recollection of a day of celebration, brimming with promises of a redeeming future, comes to mind. Now, in the solitary depths of the forest, Mijo cherishes the echo of those words: they ignited within him an absolute conviction and still chart the course of his destiny.