Variola Vera

Variola Vera is a fantastic film about a mysterious virus that spreads through Belgrade, inspired by Albert Camus’s The Plague.Innocent music seems to emerge from the pilgrim’s flute that is played on the market in an undefined country. But as soon as the pilgrim arrives in Yugoslavia with his flute, he turns out to have brought an unknown disease with him. He is taken to hospital, where no one takes much notice of him. Until it’s too late. The patient, covered with the most terrible and painful sores, dies in front of the stunned nursing staff. That is only the start of dramatic events in hospital, that unfold at an increasing rate. The government decides to take all kinds of draconian measures and the hospital is hermetically sealed off from the outside world, in the hope of saving the nation.Markovic creates a mood which does justice to the tension of the situation and the mysterious way in which the government makes its decisions, without involving the people. The real drama is set in hospital, the claustrophobic biotope that Markovic uses to examine the behaviour of people under pressure.When the problem is finally seem solved, the government organises a press conference. The whole of Europe is relieved, but is the problem really solved?