To Love Us, Hate Us, or Drink Rakija With Us?
I celebrated the Serbian Orthodox New Year and learned to greet them with a kiss three times on the cheek; that’s the Serbian way. I love that you guys keep your traditions alive and that Serbs are proud and good people. I especially love šljivovica.
—Johnny Depp
Fairies might exist. There is probably a yeti or two wandering the frozen peaks of the Himalayas. Unicorns might definitely have been a thing. Right up there with all those imaginary creatures lives a notion that contradicts everything we, the Serbs, know about ourselves. It’s called Serbophilia, and for most of our mundane lives here at the cracked heel of Europe. We didn’t even know that was a thing.
This obscure concept of Serbophilia involves the great admiration, appreciation, or even emulation of non-Serbian people for everything Serbian. By all means, emulate us all you like. We won’t sue you on account of cultural appropriation, mainly because
a) we get all giddy when someone outside the borders of our country talks positively about us
and b) we have a terrific culture and customs we want to share with the rest of the world.
In direct contrast to Serbophilia lies Serbophobia, a ridiculous term, really, because why on earth would anyone fear us? Even my grammar checker wanted to replace Serbophilia with Serbophobia, not recognizing the former as an actual word.
This sentiment seems to be much stronger and more permeable worldwide. It took so little to turn us into Hollywood’s third-favorite bad guys, and we’re still recovering from it. (Granted, the recovery might take longer if you carry a bottle of rakija with you.)
To say that the world sees us as bad guys, illiterate hillbillies of Southeastern Europe, and the root of all evil might be too strong a statement. The truth levitates somewhere in between: we’re everyone’s favorite scapegoat, the rotten egg, the broken crayon in the box.
Silly Serbian Names
In September 2013, the first episode of The Blacklist aired. The FBI’s most wanted man, played by the ever-so-charming James Spader, walks into the headquarters with information about a soon-to-be perpetrated crime by a Serbian terrorist, Ranko Zamani. Zamani plans to kidnap the daughter of a general responsible for killing his family. It’s safe to say that was the first and last episode of The Blacklist I ever watched.
We get it. Hollywood needs bad guys to catch, so their witty, antisocial cops can assume their god-given hero roles. Turning faraway nations the American people know nothing about into villains is vital for the survival of Hollywood, we get that too. The threat is less threatening when it doesn’t speak the language you speak but instead mumbles angrily in Slavic, Arabic, or African.
We also get that, for that same reason, American villains in our domestic films aren’t that scary because we can actually understand and speak your language to some extent, and we’re very well versed in Hollywood cliches—Hasta la vista, baby; I’ll be back; Yippikayay, motherflonker; Freeze!, and others the people on Balkan know by heart.
What we don’t get is why our names and our language have to be butchered in the process. Ranko is a fairly common name or nickname in these regions. The last name Zamani, while it may roll down the tongue beautifully, is as Serbian as French fries are American. On the actual list of countries where this last name may be found, Serbia is in 58th place.
If you do want to make us villains in your stories, please use more realistic first and last names so we can at least believe that your writers and producers did the basic research beforehand. It’s really hard to put ourselves in the shoes of a terrorist with a name like Zamani.
Remember, Serbian surnames typically end in -ić.
They (kind of) love us in Hollywood
Okay, writers and producers of lukewarm entertainment aside, there are some mighty names in Hollywood that actually think we’re not that bad. There’s an entire list of actors who support us, appreciate us, and stand by us in times of injustice, cruelty, and even war. One such name is Tom Hanks.
Tom is married to Rita Wilson, an Orthodox Christian practitioner. Through that long-lasting marriage, Tom is also an Orthodox Christian, although not Serbian, but more likely Greek, since his lovely wife has some Greek roots. That’s fine, we love all our Orthodox Christian brothers and sisters equally.
In one interview, Tom reportedly said that what the Serbian people are going through in their own country is cruel and demeaning. He even compared the suffering of Jews to that of the Kosovo Serbs following Kosovo’s independence in 2008. While this topic is excruciatingly political, I would not like to go into much detail about it—especially measuring suffering with other oppressed people—so I will just say that Tom Hanks seems like a heck of a guy.
We heard Richard Gere was saying something nice about us. Sharon Stone, the actress with the highest IQ among her peers, seems to grasp the idea of Serbophilia quite well. Steven Segal is a Serbian honorary citizen, same as Johnny Depp, same as John Challis, the memorable Boycie from Only Fools and Horses.
Another Hollywood A-lister, a household name, and everyone’s favorite mobster, Robert de Niro, traveled Europe as a student. He spent several memorable months in Serbia. Robert had nothing but words of praise for his hosts, who welcomed him on their farm, fed him, taught him how to drink rakija, and even helped him when the then-unknown actor was robbed outside the village. Also, he even named his first daughter Drina, after the famous Serbian novel The Bridge on the Drina.
De Niro talks fondly of our people and hospitality, and he’s always there during every US Open to cheer for Đoković. We’re particularly fond of people who like us (we’re clingy that way), so Bob may just be our No. 1. celebrity. Scootch over, Forrest Gump.
You’re not going to the Italian, or Russian, or the French front. You are going into a fight against a new enemy who is dangerous, tough, brave and sharp. You are going to the Serbian front, to Serbia, and Serbs are people who love their freedom and who are willing to fight for it to their last. Do your best so this miniscule enemy does not overshadow your glory and compromise the success you’ve achieved so far in the glorious German army.
—August von Mackensen, German Field Marshal during the WW2
The power of Hollywood stereotypes
Speaking of de Niro, have you ever seen a true American gem called Killing Season? Starring alongside John Travolta, de Niro befriends his character during a hunting expedition in the US. But his newly found buddy’s identity turns out to be sinister. Emil Kovač, played by the wickedly talented Travolta, is not only a Serb but also a former soldier of the Serbian paramilitary unit that operated during the Yugoslav wars. Kovač seeks revenge against de Niro’s character, a military veteran and former NATO operative.
The plot is somewhat similar to that pilot episode of The Blacklist (in the sense, it is thick and totally bogus). However, the only thing more painful than watching it is hearing Travolta’s attempt at the Serbian language.
It’s not that we’re recommending this movie to watch; we really aren’t. It’s a poorly written plot with shallow, stereotypical characters, and, as a bookstore, we’re not recommending movies, anyway. But this fun depiction of unrealistic Serbian bad guys contains one hilarious gaff after another.
In the scene of the Serbian bar in Belgrade, there’s a huge banner across the wall with the word Slivovica. That’s great, except that it’s šljivovica. I guess the letter Š raises confusion among the English-speaking audience, so a simplification is in order. Another sign right next to it simply says Srbin — although we give points for having both signs written in Cyrillic Serbian.
A quarter-of-the-wall sized Serbian flag can be seen for a few seconds before Travolta’s Kovač takes a seat. Although it is highly patriotic and heartwarming to see, it isn’t that realistic. You can hear Serbian chatter in the background, and people are drinking Jack Daniels.
The guy that Travolta meets in the bar to obtain info on de Niro’s guy does speak Serbian with a suspiciously Bulgarian-sounding accent. Maybe it’s because the actor playing Kovač’s informant is Bulgarian?
Hollywood has this weird fixation on making Slavic people the main villains. One of our favorite Croatian old-school actors, Rade Šerbedžija, whose last name, admittedly, does not end in -ić, has built his entire career on playing Caucasian bad guys from Russia or the ex-USSR, Serbia, Albania, Macedonia, Hungary, or any other country that Hollywood writers and producers like to lump together.
I guess there’s something villanesque about us that Hollywood recognized (or invented) years ago. Now here we are, being bashed on our heads with false names and sinister motives.
Take advice from Captain Jack Sparrow himself and celebrate anything you want with us over a bottle of homemade, fragrant šljivovica. Had all those movie makers ever drunk rakija with us, they’d know better than to write us off as terrorists.
Sure, we are dangerous, but only to ourselves.
Truly yours,
Vanja