The Dark Side of the Sun (1997)

Director:

Bozidar 'Bota' Nikolic

Writers:

Andrew Horton (writer)
Nikola Jovanovic (story)

Release Date:

20 December 1997 (Japan)

Genre:

Drama | Romance

Tagline:

They needed a miracle for their love to survive

Plot:

Traveling in search of a cure for a rare skin disease, a man finds freedom and love along the way. |

Plot Keywords:

Coming Of Age | Fatal Disease | Father Son Relationship | Leather | Motorcycle

Cast

Guy Boyd	...	Father
Brad Pitt	...	Rick
Cheryl Pollak	...	Frances
Constantin Nitchoff
Milena Dravic	...	Mother
Gorica Popovic	...	Nina
Sonja Savic
Nikola Jovanovic
Boro Begovic
Milan Sretenovic		(as Milan Sretenovic-Globus)
Andjelo Arandjelovic		(as Angelo Arangelovic)
Sreten Mitrovic
Stole Arandjelovic	...	Vidar (the healer) (as Stole Arangelovic)
Ras Rastoder
Vladan Banovic

MPAA:

Rated R for some language and nudity.

Runtime:

101 min

Country:

USA | Canada | Federal Republic of Yugoslavia

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Sound Mix:

Mono (Westrex Recording System)

Certification:

Netherlands:12 | Iceland:L | Germany:6 | USA:R | Spain:13 | UK:12

Filming Locations:

Montenegro

Company:

Avala Film

Trivia:

The film was shot in pre-war Yugoslavia during the summer of 1988. As editing neared completion civil war tore apart the region and much of the footage was lost. In 1996, after a five-year search, all of the lost footage was found and returned to producer Andjelo Arandjelovic, who worked on getting a distribution deal for the film, before it ended up getting released direct-to-video.

Soundtrack:

Yesterday Is My Tomorrow

On the whole a surprisingly good movie

I tend to dislike movies with melodramatic aspects, but this one actually works, though it doesn't really look to me like Brad Pitt in it has a condition that keeps him out of the sun, he was as toned and lightly-tan in this movie as in any I ever saw him in (apparently he had nothing to do inside in the dark but crunches :)). The locales are beautiful, the light is that Adriatic sunlight that is so marvelous, that the movie is great to see just from a cinematographic aspect. And Mr. Pitt actually did some much more than just getting by/decent acting in this one, one of the hardest things to do in the profession is to be the object of a tearjerker, and he successfully pulls it off. It is a shame he was just compensated some 10k-12k for this picture and in some recent ones so much for so little(but then he has had his distractions so I shouldn't carp). Excellent performances by the father and love interest characters round it out.(The faith-healer aspect was a bit jarring, as I was not aware that this had been a Yugoslavian/Serbo-Croatian tradition and it seemed a bit New-Agey to me, though I have since been shown an Ivo Andric story where it was mentioned in that region in an 1890s setting so it is presumably legitimate background). The other elements-sound, direction, etc. were up to high-quality low budget studio production in the States, and better than most of those. The dialogue flows well, and the original language is clearly English, this is _not_ a dubbed movie. I am surprised it went to video directly, I feel it could have easily gone to a successful theatrical release. Much much worse has done so, and profited greatly. It deserves a look-see.