The first ring of the telephone in Iva Radivojević’s second feature film, When the phone rangmarks more than just the beginning of a conversation – it signals the disintegration of a young girl’s world.

Set in Yugoslavia in the early 1990s, the film depicts the country’s disintegration from the perspective of eleven-year-old Lana (Natalija Ilincic), who receives a phone call just as war breaks out, telling her that her grandfather has died. This simple phone call serves as a pivotal point for the film’s exploration of memory and identity.

Radivojević brings a very personal touch to this film, based on her own experiences when she left Yugoslavia during the unrest. Her previous works, such as Borders disappear And Alephhave established her as a filmmaker who is not afraid to address socio-political issues through personal reflection and poetic images. Borders disappearin particular, illuminated the plight of refugees with a sensitivity that also permeates her latest works, while the Borgesian poetics of Aleph can be found in the time-changing storytelling of When the phone rang.

When the phone rang fits seamlessly into Radivojević’s work, continuing her exploration of displacement and the fluid nature of memory. The film is divided into eleven segments, each introduced by the ringing of a telephone, creating a rhythm that reflects the fragmentary, non-linear nature of memory. Each call triggers a memory, weaving a web of events that together represent the protagonist’s sense of displacement and the erasure of her former identity.

Radivojević’s direction is characterized by deliberate pacing and a focus on atmosphere. The phone call announcing the death of Lana’s grandfather becomes a recurring motif, embodying loss and the abrupt intrusion of historical events into private life. The social and political unrest in Yugoslavia has recently been a theme in films such as Emilija Gašić’s 78 daysin which the director uses the aesthetics of home videos to create an authentic domestic video diary of three sisters during the NATO bombing of Serbia in 1999.

Similar to Gašić’s 78 daysUsing the framework of a coming-of-age story, Radivojević follows the relatively mundane activities of Lana against the backdrop of forced migration. The narrative technique – reconstructing memories around a central traumatic event – ​​allows Radivojević to delve into the subjective nature of memory. By presenting memories as disjointed and sometimes contradictory, she underscores the idea that personal history is not a linear narrative, but a series of impressions and emotions, each shaped by time and perspective.

When the phone rang uses a time-loop narrative technique reminiscent of the films of Shahram Mokri. Radivojević tackles sociopolitical themes but takes a more playful approach despite the traumatic events that the breakup of Yugoslavia brought. Lana’s memories become a series of diverging paths, with each phone call turning into a mirror maze of condensed memories, creating a compressed vision of a childhood and a country within a single day.

Less surreal and more poetic, When the phone rang evokes nostalgia, as Lana’s memories are less haunting than Mokri’s depictions of political or social upheaval. Radivojević creates a retro-nostalgic atmosphere with 1990s art direction, stirring memories for those who grew up in Central or Eastern Europe at that time.

Cameraman Martin Dicicco, who also worked on Alephuses close-ups with a hypnotic effect, similar to Michael Haneke’s The seventh continentbut with a less threatening tone, supported by minimalist dialogues. Lana is portrayed in the microcosm of her life in a high-rise building and its surroundings, which sometimes creates a feeling of claustrophobia. Radivojević himself took over the artistic direction, preferring a muted pastel color palette.

In When the phone rangIn her film, Radivojević combines a coming-of-age drama with an autobiographical essay, offering a personal testimony about identity, loss and displacement. By using cinematic techniques to bend time, she explores the (re)construction of personal history and memory.

Through a mixture of retro nostalgia, melancholic undertones and underlying tension When the phone rang revives the coming-of-age genre. Radivojević’s distinctive style combines the poetic with the political, transforming personal experiences into a more universal narrative.

When the phone rang received a special mention at the 2024 Locarno Film Festival.