Republic of Srpska, B&H / 2018. / 31’ 16” / Documentary

Written and directed by: Snježan Lalović

Kazuo Tanaka arrived in Yugoslavia from Japan in 1961, at the same time when they announced that Ivo Andrić had won the Nobel Prize for Literature. He never thought he would later translate Andrić, Njegoš and many other Serbian writers into Japanese. In Yugoslavia, he made friends and stayed in touch with them after returning to Japan. He also built his bridges with his friend Hiroshi Yamasaki Vukelić – together, they compiled the first Japanese-Serbo-Croatian dictionary. He returned to the Balkans in 2003 after reading a report in a Japanese newspaper about the Art Festival in Višegrad during the war in B&H. His connections with Yugoslavia lingered on even after his death. Tokyo, Belgrade and Višegrad became permanent guardians of his ashes.

 

Snježan Lalović 

Born in 1960 in Sarajevo, where he graduated in journalism from the Faculty of Political Sciences. Received his master’s degree from the Faculty of Philosophy in Pale, where he has lived and worked since 1992. Participated in the creation of Serbian Radio and Serbian Television, and directed more than 400 documentary shows on RTRS.

His documentary films won a series of awards at international festivals in Belgrade, Budapest, Serpukhov, East Sarajevo, Athens, Banja Koviljača, Sergiyev Posad…

Director of the Republika Srpska’s Cinematheque.