Walter Defends Sarajevo is a 1972 Yugoslavian film directed by Hajrudin Krvavac and starring Bata Živojinović, Ljubiša Samardžić and Rade Marković. The film centers around a mysterious figure named 'Walter', who is actively disrupting the attempts of German commander Alexander Löhr to retreat from the Balkans. The film's eponymous character, Walter, is loosely based around Vladimir Perić, whose nom de guerre was 'Valter'.
Plot In late 1944, as the end of World War II approaches, the Wehrmacht's high command determines to pull out General Alexander Löhr's Army Group E from the Balkans back to Germany. They plan to supply the tank columns with fuel from a depot in Sarajevo. The Yugoslav partisans' leader in the city, a mysterious man known as Walter, presents a grave danger to the operation's success, and the Germans dispatch Standartenführer von Dietrich of the SD to deal with him. As no one in the city seems to know what Walter even looks like, Dietrich manages to have an operative infiltrate the resistance under the guise of Walter himself. The partisans are caught in a deadly game of betrayal, fraud and imposture while trying to frustrate the Germans' plans.
Ending At the end of the movie, von Dietrich muses that he has finally realised why he never managed to defeat his nemesis Walter; standing on a hill he points at Sarajevo below and remarks in German: Sehen Sie diese Stadt? Das ist Walter! ("You see that city? That's Walter!") This was intended to send a message of unity consistent with the official politics of the multi-ethnic state of Yugoslavia.
Cast Bata Živojinović as Pilot (Walter) Ljubiša Samardžić as Zis Rade Marković as Sead Kapetanović Slobodan Dimitrijević as Suri Neda Spasojević as Mirna Dragomir Gidra Bojanić as Kondor Pavle Vuisić as train dispatcher Faruk Begolli as Branko Stevo Žigon as Dr Mišković Jovan Janićijević as Josic Relja Bašić as Obersturmführer Hannjo Hasse as Col. von Dietrich Rolf Römer as SS-Hauptsturmführer Bischoff Fred Delmare as Sgt. Edele (credited as Axel Delmare) Herbert Köfer as German general Wilhelm Koch-Hooge as Lieutenant Colonel Hagen Helmut Schreiber as Lieutenant Colonel Weiland Emir Kusturica as a young man
Production Although not aiming to reflect history, the film's leading character was named after the partisan leader Vladimir Perić, known by his nom de guerre 'Walter', who commanded a resistance group in Sarajevo from 1943 until his death in the battle to liberate the city on April 6, 1945. Hajrudin Krvavac dedicated the picture to the people of Sarajevo and their heroism during the war. Reflecting the theme of "brotherhood and unity", the film shows all the three main ethnic groups in Bosnia-Herzegovina, namely the Bosnians, the Serbs, and the Croatians all working together in the Partisans to resist Nazi Germany. The film marked the beginning of Emir Kusturica's career as it was his first appearance in a major motion picture in a small role playing a young communist activist.
Release The film premiered in Sarajevo on Wednesday, 12 April 1972 in front of 5,000 spectators at the recently built Skenderija Hall. The venue thus hosted another lavish partisan film première, two and a half years after Veljko Bulajić's Battle of Neretva premiered in October 1969. Marshal Josip Broz Tito was not in attendance this time, though the premiere still saw its share of Yugoslav celebrities and functionaries including the film's cast as well as the Red Star Belgrade head coach Miljan Miljanić, actress Špela Rozin, Skenderija's director and former Sarajevo mayor Ljubo Kojo, Bosna Film chairman Neđo Parežanin, etc.
Analysis Walter Defends Sarajevo belonged to a genre of films known as the Partisan film, which were popular in Yugoslavia in the 1960s and 1970s. Most Partisan films tended to focus on the collective with a couple of Partisan characters serving as the joint protagonists rather than having a single protagonist. The Partisans were depicted in these films as narodni heroji ("people's heroes") who came from every ethnic group in Yugoslavia; were a mixture of workers, peasants and intellectuals; and included a number of both men and women. The depiction of the narodni heroji was intended to give the message that virtually everyone in Yugoslavia had supported the Partisans in the "People's Liberation War" as the war was called in Yugoslavia. Walter Defends Sarajevo was unusual in the Partisan film genre in having a single protagonist. Walter played by the highly "charismatic" Serb stunt man turned actor Bata Živojinović was the most efficient character with regards to killing Germans in the Partisan films as Walter killed 42 Germans over the course of the film. In terms of a body count, Walter was the most successful Partisan cinematic character ever depicted. Likewise, Walter Defends Sarajevo was unusual in being set in a city instead of the countryside as the Partisan films usually were. The majority of the guerrilla war in Yugoslavia was fought in the mountains and forests, hence the tendency of the Partisan films to be set against the backdrop of mountains and forests. The city of Sarajevo served as a virtual character in the film as Krvavac made much use of the narrow labyrinthine streets of Sarajevo dating back from the Ottoman era to provide an atmospheric settling. Two of Sarajevo's most prominent landmarks, namely the Old Orthodox Church and the Emperor's Mosque feature in the film.
One tradition in the Partisan film that Walter Defends Sarajevo followed was a narrator relating the previous events prior to the film and the use of stock footage from World War Two of the Wehrmacht overrunning Yugoslavia in April 1941 along footage of the ruins of Belgrade after the devastating Luftwaffe bombing raid of 6 April 1941 at the beginning of the film. The mélange of stock footage was intended to show that the film was grounded in history; that the Wehrmacht was a highly formidable foe; the failures of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia to defend its people; and the cruelty and ruthlessness of the Nazis. Likewise, when the film proper begins, it follows another tradition of the Partisan films where a group of Wehrmacht and SS officers meet to discuss their plans to crush the Partisans. Walter is shown as being supported by all of the people of Sarajevo and has Serb, Croat and Bosnian Muslim sidekicks to assist him, which followed the standard trope of the Partisan film genre in stressing the multi-ethnic character of the Partisans. Most notably, Walter's own ethnicity is never stated in the film, making him a stand-in for Yugoslavia itself. The Spanish historian Mercedes Camino described Walter Defends Sarajevo as being more like a spy film or an urban thriller instead of the war films that the Partisan films are usually allocated under. Camino wrote the mood of the film owned much to the style of film noir with scenes set at night with atmospheric lighting that cast long shadows, which gave the message that Walter operated in a dark, dangerous world. The climactic fight atop of a moving train has been described as an action scene equal to any action sequence in a Hollywood film. The film is much beloved in Sarajevo, and the character of Walter is often invoked as a symbol of Sarajevo along with the line from the German officer pointing down at Sarajevo "das ist Walter!" The American historian Robert Donia wrote: "Valter brani Sarajevo undoubtedly overstated the universality of Partisan resistance, but it aptly captured the indefatigable determination and remarkable resilience of the Communist-led resistance fighters who harassed Sarajevo's occupiers during the war and aided in driving them from the city in 1945. Vladimir Perić-Valter became Sarajevo's embodiment of the postwar Partisan memorial culture that flourished in Yugoslavia during the socialist period." Donia noted that in Communist Yugoslavia the standard narrative of remembering the war was that all of the peoples of Yugoslavia were more or less equally victims of fascism, which was reflected in Walter Defends Sarajevo. However, Donia noted that this way of presenting history was not in fact true as 70% of Sarajevans who were killed during the German occupation in 1941-1945 came from Sarajevo's Jewish community, which was almost wiped out, and the remaining 30% of the victims came from the other ethnic groups in Sarajevo.
Reception Walter Defends Sarajevo received a favorable response from the Yugoslav audience, especially in Sarajevo itself.
The film was distributed in sixty countries, and achieved its greatest success in the People's Republic of China, becoming the country's most popular foreign film in the 1970s, being viewed by an estimated 300 million people in the year of its release. Owing mainly to the Chinese audience, Walter Defends Sarajevo is one of the most watched war films of all time. During the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution (1966–1969), film production almost ceased in China while foreign films were banned.