Underground

Underground is a 1995 comedy-drama set in Belgrade, beginning during the Second World War. Two friends, the opportunistic Marko and the hot-headed Petar, known as Blacky, supply weapons to the resistance while profiting from black-market dealings. To keep Blacky out of danger, Marko hides him, his family and other partisans in a cellar, becoming their only link to the outside world. He also takes Blacky's lover, the actress Natalija, for himself. When the war ends, Marko chooses not to tell those below that peace has come, and they carry on making weapons for a conflict that exists only in his stories. The deception stretches across decades, until the hidden group finally reaches the surface and finds a country changed beyond recognition.

Emir Kusturica directed and co-wrote the film with Dušan Kovačević. It followed When Father Was Away on Business, Time of the Gypsies and Arizona Dream in his filmography, and was made on a budget of about 14 million dollars. Miki Manojlović plays Marko, with Lazar Ristovski as Blacky, Mirjana Joković as Natalija, Slavko Štimac as Marko's brother Ivan, Ernst Stötzner as the German officer Franz, and Srđan Todorović as Blacky's son Jovan. It runs 170 minutes and was a co-production involving several European countries.

Audience response has been strong: on IMDb it holds 8 out of 10 from around 64,000 votes, and on TMDB 7.7 out of 10 from roughly 800 votes. A critics' rating stands at 7.8 out of 10 from 37 reviews.