Beautiful People

Issue Number: 
305
Published: 
2002-01-25


Art/Foreign and Comedy.
Starring: Charlotte Coleman, Charles Kay, Rosalind Ayres, Roger Sloman, Julian Firth.
Director: Jasmin Dizdar.
Producers: Ben Woolford, Ben Gibson, Roger Shannon.

In 1994, while a war rages in Bosnia, the conflict manages to spill over into London. It's not a pretty picture: Street violence, class consciousness and xenophobia are rife, although acts of kindness intersperse the grim landscape. A Croat and a Serb, originally from the same village but now sworn enemies, meet by chance on a London bus, and a fight ensues, with both ending up in the hospital. The Croat and Serb antagonists are brought into a hospital where another patient, Pero (Edin Dzandzanovic), a good-natured Bosnian refugee (and repentant wartime killer), is admitted, having been run down while trying to return a wallet to a disgruntled woman who ran out of a cafe; he falls in love there with Portia (Charlotte Coleman), a trainee doctor whose father is a smug Tory MP given to bland utterances on the Balkan crisis. A BBC reporter, Jerry (Gilbert Martin), sets out to Bosnia, only to return with his leg amputated. This is a story with amazing coincidences and wonderful characters, all set in the time of a crisis.

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