Writing Oneself with the Gaze: Ante Babaja’s Dobro jutro

Starting with her personal relation to Babaja as the director of the intimist documentary film Dobro jutro (2007), the author explains the role that the filmmaker’s first and at the same time last autobiographical film plays in his entire oeuvre or the way that Babaja’s previous preoccupations (for example, with the consumable body or, in the words of Ante Peterlić, “with the accidentalness of appearance and disappearance”) are synthesised precisely in this special creation. Dobro jutro uses excerpts from the director’s earlier works to define the position of its hero, Babaja himself, whose younger co-workers teach him to use an electronic camera, which is why the author deals with Babaja’s earlier works and explains how they treat one’s relation to death and Babaja’s other topics. But, as the text highlights, this director is a master of film form who strongly involves the viewer into his intellectual (but not also emotional!) intimacy which is why we can understand Babaja’s films as one comprehensive essay on life and death that began a long time ago and was recently powerfully completed.

The integral version of this article can be found in the printed KINO!