Fiume o morte!
Igor Bezinović’s unique hybrid documentary recalls how an Italian poet occupied the Croatian city of Rijeka.
Image courtesy of ICA Cinema.
In the 2025 Days of Croatia Film Festival this film won the Jury Prize as well as the Audience Award, thus proving its appeal both to the jurors and to the general public. Given that this work is set in Croatia in the city of Rijeka it could be thought that its success there was due to its local interest rather than evidence of any wider appeal. More significant therefore was another double award at an international film festival, this being in Rotterdam where it carried off both the 2025 Tiger Award and the Fipresci Prize. Indeed, if one looks at its impact more widely one finds that in total it has triumphed at least fourteen times at festivals. It now becomes the first film by Igor Bezinović to receive a release in Britain although it is his third feature and he has also made numerous short films.
Bezinović is himself Croatian and he was born in 1983 in the city featured in this film although it is in essence an account of historical events that took place there between 1919 and 1921 at which time its name was Fiume. It was then that the celebrated poet and playwright Gabriele D’Annunzio entered this port on the northern Adriatic coast and took over, a conquest which increasingly saw him acting like a fascist leader. Despite being Italian himself and claiming Fiume for Italy, his actions in this respect were not undertaken with the approval of the government in Rome. However, D'Annunzio had his own legionnaires and once established in power youngsters came from Italy to join him. His time in Fiume was a foreshadowing of Italian fascism which would soon flourish under Mussolini and, while D’Annunzio was less adept, his sixteen months in the city saw him acting as commander of the self-proclaimed state that he called the Italian Regency of Canaro. In that time opposition was silenced, unauthorised meetings were banned and young men were required to join the army with the threat of a jail sentence if they failed to comply.
For many Croatians, whether or not they live in Rijeka, this slice of past history may be familiar, but it is worth retelling in the form of a film about it not just for its own sake but as a pointer to people acting in comparable ways today (when D’Annunzio declares that “whoever is not with me is against me” it is all too easy to decide who would echo that sentiment today). However, the approach that Bezinović brings to his material is decidedly unexpected in more ways than one. First, although some of those awards won by the film were in the category of Best Documentary and the events depicted are told through detailed voice-overs (many by Bezinović himself but with others taking over from time to time), the film also features re-enacted scenes in which contemporary inhabitants of Rijeka portray what happened. This is done frequently although the amount of actual dialogue heard in these episodes is very limited and most of the time the re-enactments are intercut with historical footage of the actual events.
A further unusual feature here is that even though a relatively short period of time is covered at least seven men take on scenes in which they appear as D’Annunzio. It is also the case that we are introduced to the people who participate in this way whether they be those representing D’Annunzio or some other historical figure: their names are given and in many cases they are briefly interviewed on camera about their reaction to becoming involved.
Despite the novelty of all this, it might well be expected that the serious nature of the subject matter would have yielded a film that would find no place for humour. But that is far from being the case. Just like Chaplin who recognised when making The Great Dictator in 1940 that a film containing humour that regarded Hitler as a buffoon was a valid way of attacking him, Bezinović wants to use mockery to underline the irony and absurdity of D‘Annunzio's beliefs in himself and his capabilities. This mockery takes several forms including a music track that often undermines the pomposity of marches and other historical images while the modern-day footage in colour re-creating past events sometimes serves to emphasise their ludicrous nature. Above all Fiume o morte! (the title being the very slogan adopted by D’Annunzio meaning “Fiume Or Death") is a film about time and how in the scale of things a would-be fascist like D’Annunzio for all his self-belief can be shown to be delusional and, in a manner of speaking, insignificant (which is not to deny the real suffering that he caused including the violence of December 1920 which, occurring just before he stepped down, became known as ‘Bloody Christmas’). Early scenes in this film emphasise this very point. Accosted today in the streets of Rijeka plenty of its citizens admit to knowing nothing of Gabriele D’Annunzio and, while we see pictures of the old bridges between Fiume and the neighbouring area of Susak which he ordered to be destroyed, we are shown too the bridges which replaced them. We are reminded also of how over the years the city has been under the control of a whole range of countries and of how the language that dominates today is not Italian but Croatian while, lasting longer than memories of D’Annunzio who died in 1938, the local dialect of Fiumano has not altogether disappeared.
Effective as it is in its offbeat way, Fiume o morte! lacks the force of a masterpiece but in following its own path it is consistent throughout and for many viewers it will be informative. Especially in the early scenes which comment on the city’s history in voice-over, the speed of delivery can be rather too fast for the likes of myself to take in fully and readily (if one were reading a book about it, one would probably set a slower pace here). But that is a minor point and the film does work on its own highly individual terms. The example set by D’Annunzio just over a hundred years ago remains a serious warning but Bezinović's film is also about surviving it and when the film comes to an end the main credits play out against contemporary street images which have an almost carnivalesque tone. They capture a spirit of celebration and hope, a defiant optimism whether valid or not.
MANSEL STIMPSON
Cast: Andrea Marsanich, Albano Vučetić, Tihomir Buterin, Izet Medošević, Milovan Vecerina Cico, Massimo Ronzani, Ćenan Beljulji, Lovro Mirth, Tonka Mrsic, Silvana Zorich, Noemi Dessardo, Sara Marsanich, Renzo Chiepolo, Sandro Ferletta, and the voice of Igor Bezinović.
Dir Igor Bezinović, Pro Vanj Jambrović and Tibor Keser, Screenplay Igor Bezinović, Ph Gregor Bozić, Art Dir Anton Spazzapan, Ed Hroslava Brkusić, Music Giovanni Maier and Hrvoje Nikšić, Costumes Tajci Čekada and Manuela Paladin Šabanović.
Restart/Nosorogi/Videomante-ICA Cinema.
112 mins. Croatia/Italy/Slovenia. 2025. UK Rel: 28 November 2025. Cert. 15.
