GIFT OF OBLIVION

The Gift of Oblivion examines how the memory of World War II in the post-Yugoslav region is turned into an instrument of political manipulation. The film follows the ways in which historical facts are over time reshaped, relativized, or instrumentalized within contemporary national narratives. In Croatia, certain public actors downplay the scale of Ustaša crimes, while in Serbia such views are often presented as the dominant opinion of society as a whole. At the same time, the rehabilitation of the Chetnik movement in Serbia has been significantly carried out through court decisions and shifts in public discourse. In both contexts, there are increasing attempts to simplify and invert complex historical memory, often under the guise of scholarly argumentation. Through testimonies of survivors, historians, and public figures, the film explores who the Chetniks, Ustaša, and Partisans really were, as well as how collective memory of them has changed from the end of the war to the present day. A particular focus is placed on Jasenovac, a topic that for decades has been used as a political weapon—through the manipulation of victim numbers and the perpetuation of nationalist narratives. At the center of the film lies the question: where is the victim in all of this, and why does social memory change? Who shapes these changes, and to what end? Gift of Oblivion is an attempt to expose the mechanism of revisionism and, through confronting the past, open space for truth.