Underground (Film)

Updated June 26, 2020 | Infoplease Staff

Kusturica's Underground won the Palm d'Or at Cannes in 1995, and it took more than two years for a U.S. release. The length, though cut from 192 to 169 minutes, partially explains the delay, but it's more likely that the distributors didn't think American audiences would have an appetite for a political film about the former Yugoslavia. In this sprawling, brawling epic that spans 60 years, Marko (Manojlovic) and Blacky (Ristovski) team up to battle occupying Nazis and fall in love with the same woman, Vera (Karanovic). When World War II intensifies, Marko, Blacky and a group of fellow Serbs hide out in a bunker and begin manufacturing weapons. Only Marko emerges during the day, selling the munitions and rising in the Communist Party ranks. Although the war ends, Marko keeps his comrades in the dark and continues to profit from their underground work.