The feature film “Megdan”, produced by the company owned by Aleksa Balašević, the son of the late Serbian signer, Đorđe Balašević, was allocated 15 million dinars from the Novi Sad city budget following the city government launching a competition which total budget was 21 million dinars.
Đorđe Kaćanski, a member of the city commission that decided on the budget allocations, says that they stand behind their decision. Kaćanski, the well-known editor of the film programme of the Novi Sad Cultural Centre, reveals that the three-member commission made the decision unanimously. He did not want to comment on individual projects, but he noted that all decisions were “made honestly”.
“None of the commission members has any close ties with the selected projects. Of course we can make mistakes sometimes and we can’t please everyone. For instance, you are well aware how important is Svetozar Miletić for the history of Novi Sad. When finally someone wanted to make a film about him and when we supported it, some people were unhappy with the fact that the film director came from Belgrade,” Kaćanski adds.
Nebojša Novi Milenković, writer and art historian from Novi Sad, is one of those who protested against the Commission’s decision to allocate money to Aleksa Balašević’s film as “Balašević Junior has no cinematographic experience or references”, and adds, for comparison, that the young Balašević got more money for his film than the renowned film director Želimir Žilnik throughout his entire career.
(N1, 20.12.2022)
Photo credits: Ana Paunković
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