OBRENOVAC 1003

Synopsis

Obrenovac 1003 is a movie about a devastation of an entire Serbian city of Obrenovac during a flood of, almost, biblical proportions that struck Serbia, Bosnia and Croatia in May 2014.
This Balkans region, already devastated by decades of war, tensions and impoverished by the international economic sanctions, was struck by the ultimate force – nature. Three-months volume of rainfall fell in just three days causing a “river tsunami” that rolled into Obrenovac in a matter of hours, and turned it into a pool of dirty toxic sewage and mud waters, 2 meters deep on average.
Many people lost their lives and majority lost all their possessions. The citizens were evacuated from their homes literally barefoot and almost without their clothes. The filmmakers live in Obrenovac, and the movie was shot during and after the flood. The conditions were very hard making it difficult for them to overcome technical problems such as recharging the batteries for their equipment (in a city without electricity) in order to continue filming or the amount of gear they can carry through waters.
This is a movie about the suffering and solidarity of ordinary people during and after the flood trying to get back on with their lives in the midst of a destruction of their basic life necessities, without electricity, water, phones, food or clothes. Obrenovac 1003 features interviews of people struck by flood, volunteers, and scenes of people / children being rescued from the raging currents in the middle of the city. This catastrophe triggered an outpour of international humanitarian aid from Europe, Russia, Canada and other countries but received very little media coverage in North America.