Interview: ‘Murina’ Director Antoneta Alamat Kusijanović

The idyllic quality of the Croatian coastline where Antoneta Alamat Kusijanović’s Murina takes place is deceiving. The vast blue sea is hindered by gigantic hard-edged outcrops and the spectacular scenery is devoid of vegetation which means there’s no hiding from the hot scorching sun. By exquisitely combining beauty and roughness, this setting is the perfect cauldron to blend feelings of desire, repression, longing, and jealousy until a boiling point takes over its characters. The end product is an extraordinary psychodramatic coming-of-age story that won the prestigious Caméra d’Or winner at Cannes 2021 and has been championed by Martin Scorsese himself.

Murina follows Julija (Gracija Filipović), a quiet 16-year-old girl living in a Croatian fishing village with her father Ante (Leon Lučev), a despicable man who vents his life’s frustrations in the form of psychological violence toward Jilija and her mother Nela (Danica Ćurčić), a former beauty queen now resigned to a soulless abusive marriage. Julija’s desire to break free from her father’s oppressive clutches is exacerbated by the arrival of the charismatic and wealthy Javier (Cliff Curtis), an old family friend whose flirting ways toward Nela soon become a source of hope for the rebellious Julija.

To learn more about the film’s impressive storytelling and aesthetic achievements, I spoke with Kusijanović, a Croatian director now based in New York whose portfolio includes four short films, a music video, and now a feature film that has garnered critical success around the world. Murina has won awards in France, United States, United Kingdom, Bulgaria, and Slovenia, among other countries. But maybe the most fascinating response to the film has come from the director’s own homeland of Croatia.

“The film was very viewed and well-attended in Croatia. I feel that there were opposite reactions to the film and, for me, both were positive,” said Kusijanović in our interview. “There were a lot of people who felt that the film was about them, about their family, their parents, their siblings, and themselves, and they felt they somehow found refuge in it. And then there were a lot of people who felt that nothing happened in it because it’s a regular Croatian family.”

That’s how brutally authentic Murina is. However, whether it’s Croatia, France, or my own country of México, Kusijanović’s piercing exploration of psychological abuse and toxic masculinity is universal. “I’m sure that in many ways you can relate in terms of how certain things are just named: the culture, the temperament, or the tradition,” said the director. “We can’t be harsh because it’s not only in our countries, it’s everywhere a little bit — and more in some places. It just has different names and it’s very good and important to call the things by their real names. That’s what I was hoping would happen with Murina.”

But in the midst of the film’s tense patriarchal ocean, Julija receives a tough yet powerful first-hand lesson of resilience, change, and the necessary actions to induce it in your own life. The conversation touched on these themes as well as Kusijanović’s fascination with water, her relationship with star Gracija Filipović, costume design, Hélène Louvart’s work, and much more.

Film Cred: Why did you want your first feature film to be shot in Croatia?

Antoneta Alamat Kusijanović: There’s a quality to every film that is not in the script and is not necessarily in the way you plan it, shoot it, execute it, or the actors act it; it’s a little like a spirit. And I very much knew what it was for me for my first film. It’s something that is innate, that I was born with. I felt it would be more emotionally impactful if I made my first film from that place.

FC: How do you think the combined experiences of being Croatian and a New Yorker helped the movie achieve success?

AAK: For me being Croatian but having an outsider’s view of things helped me make the movie relatable to people around the world but specific enough to Croatia. It’s both very universal and local. My education is also like that. I was studying in Croatia but also I was studying in the United States. These are tools that I certainly used when I was building this story.

FC: This is a movie that exquisitely walks between a lot of sensations and feelings. Repression, desire, jealousy, tension. How did you set up this in the script? How did you achieve this atmosphere?

AAC: Whenever I’m in doubt about which way to go I resort back to the character and what the character feels at that moment. A character has conflicts and desires and needs — some things they are unaware of, some things they are very aware of. The character will create the plot and the audience will follow that character’s intention and feel the same as them, as long as you keep them in mind.

FC: In that sense, what was the hardest element to write?

AAC: It was hard for me to write this utopian world as not a holiday place. I really wanted people to see that this is a hard life — visually, that is not instantly represented as a hard life. It actually took me some time to understand how people will see that this is not a holiday. This thought process was the one that created the sense of dread, isolation, and stark inhabitable space.

FC: You go quite a long way with Gracija Filipović. She’s been in three of your projects now and has grown alongside your filmography in a way. How does it feel for you to grow alongside her and see her become this incredible actress that is getting worldwide recognition?

AAC: It’s amazing because it started as parenthood and then I was a big sister. From mother, I was promoted to a big sister. And right now I’m not a big sister anymore, I’m a peer, we are friends. That evolution was certainly very fruitful but also it was hard to shift those hats both for her and me. Each stage of her development and growing up required different strategies. I was confronted with her puberty, and that also made its way to the movie.

FC: Ante is despicable. The writing of the character is tremendous. How do you direct this character? What directions do you give Leon Lučev? What do you say to him to push him to be so despicable? 

AAC: I told him that his daughter is his son… and I told him that his wife is his biggest value… that is something he can trait. And I told him that this is his last opportunity to become the man that the village will look up to. I think I told him these three things.

FC: To prepare for their roles, the cast spent many hours together in character. How did you manage things not to go overboard?

AAC: You could never leave the room. You have to be there. For them to be free in their improvisation you are there to lead them and, of course, things cannot get out of control if the director is there to bring them back. But that’s not only that. It’s also about making sure that the improvisation is useful for the movie, that they are not improvising without a structure, endlessly. For me, it was very important to stay alert and to know whether a situation helps the movie or not.

FC: I see you have an affinity for the water and the ocean. We can appreciate it in Murina, your music video Silente, and your short films Into the Blue and Eye for an Eye. Where does this affinity or fascination come from?

AAC: I’m a water director! I grew up on an island with my great-grandmother and grandmother and I’ve lived all my life on the water. Even now in New York, I am in between two rivers by the sea. Water for me is a place of subconscious… where the character can tell and express their desires and wants that otherwise would be forbidden above the water. 

FC: It must have been hard shooting underwater. Specifically, I’d like to know about the cave scene in the third act. It looked quite challenging. How was this done? Was the murina CG? 

AAC: It’s all CGI. It was created from scratch. I got a dead murina on the market and we 3D mapped it and then the team that animated it watched a lot of murina movements to capture the very specific pattern of the muscle movement it has. Everything about murina underwater — leading Julija and coming out of the crevasse — it’s all animated.

It was challenging to shoot underwater. Yes, the cave was very challenging. I cannot tell you whether it was more challenging emotionally or physically. It was cold and scary and it was expressing something that is visceral that I cannot put a finger on… it’s something about survival but also about injustice. It felt very real: that shoot and that night. I liked that night. 

FC: The scene with the eel dying in a bucket, is that also CG?

AAC: No. That was a pickup that we were very lucky to get from the fishermen that actually caught murina. It was a “quickly bring the camera!” moment and we were able to shoot it. Very lucky. No animals were harmed during the shooting.

FC: The costume design is also very important. How did you work alongside costume designer Amela Baksic to bring this to life?

AAC: Costume design is definitely a tool I really enjoyed using. Amela Baksic is an incredible New York-based costume designer. We were very aware that Julija had to enter this suit that is out of the world, that is almost given my gods. It’s something that gives her power that is beyond human. It’s very important that she does not leave the homeland or go into the unknown with that artificial power: she needs to go back to her own power. And that suit…I also wanted it to kind of feel like moray eels in the way it is underwater. We took some eight months to design it because it had to be like a skin but not overly sensual and a little bit androgynous. There are a lot of things that this one single suit had to satisfy story-wise and emotionally.

Also, the red dress is important. It’s about the difference in generations, what it means for one generation to keep that desire in the box and to open that box once again when your daughter ignites it.

FC: The setting is also key. It’s this hot searing place, there’s no vegetation, there’s no hiding. It’s beautiful but rough. And that’s perfect for Julija’s story. Did you use only natural light? How did you work with cinematographer Hélène Louvart to maximize the impact of this environment on your characters?

AAC: We used as little light as possible. During the day we only used natural light because it was not possible to compete with the sun that is so strong; we were on an island very far from any outlet that would be able to support that electricity. For the big village scene, we did have one cherry pick with big lights to kind of imitate the moon and for that two-day shoot, we had special equipment and people to come on set. Besides that, we had very minimal light and Hélène is very good at creating this natural light; it almost felt like something practical. I mean, she’s one of the best cinematographers of her time.

FC: What’s a recent film that has inspired you?

AAC: Noche de fuego [Prayers for the Stolen]. Excellent. I loved Noche de fuego. It’s so powerful and it was so painful and so beautiful to witness these three little girls finding joy in a completely unpredictable future against an omnipotent luring antagonist that is invisible but is there all the time. It’s a beautiful film. Congratulations to your fellow Mexicans Nico [Celis] and Tatiana [Huezo].

Murina is distributed by Kino Lorber in North America. It opens theatrically at Metrograph in New York on July 8th, and at Laemmle Theatres in Los Angeles on July 15th with rollout to select cities.