The first time 15-year-old Ahmed (Ariv Jacob) is smiling on screen broadly reaches the level of cliché that can light up someone’s contagious smile. In the midst of the bright colors of an EDM festival taking place in the middle of the forest, the sad-eyed teenager surrenders to an upbeat tune and a crowd of young people around him. By this point, most viewers will already be unbearably disarmed.”DJ Ahmed“,” Georgie M. Onkowski‘s steeped in music, cheerful humor and a stylish debut in a northern Macedonian village.
But that moment of enjoyment is only a brief respite from Ahmed’s arduous responsibilities of tending sheep and caring for his baby brother Naeem (Agush Agushev), the picture of innocence and adoration, who has not spoken since their mother’s death. From the get-go, Unkovski delivers a rich soundtrack that blends modern English-language songs with region-specific tracks, as well as Alen Sinkauz and Nenad Sinkauz’s larger-than-life score, which sounds as if Ahmed were legendary bombarded on a quest. To convey how inexistent the connection between the story and the music it scores is, the director uses slow motion in subtle instances, asking the audience to be present with the experience of Ahmed, Nayem and ultimately Aya (the enchanting Spunky Dora Akan Zlatanova) as a girl visiting from Germany to go with her wedding. Rank.
He distresses his wife by forbidding his children from listening to music, and Ahmed’s father (Axel Mohamed) shows little sympathy for his teenage son. Worried about young Destiny, the strict parent spends so much time and money taking him to visit a questionable handler, that he even drops out of school so he can take care of their animals. Moderate Ahmed does not protest, but the visible weight weighs on him. Fortunately, Unkovski avoids making the father completely uncredited, but paints him as a product of his environment, with Ahmed representing the promise of a different, more sensitive destiny.
In finding Jakup to play the likable protagonist, Unkovski discovered a true diamond in the rough whose face exudes the sincerity of an untainted soul. “I like that you don’t know how to lie,” Aya tells him as the two (and Little Naeem) hang out, away from their grim realities. However, the extraordinary Jakup does not go for simplistic naivety in his quietly emotional performance, but communicates Ahmed’s inner self in his shy smile or his brilliant eyes. Encased within the character’s unimposed frame, there is a selfless courage that drives him to stand up for others – especially the beautiful Naim.
With stunning golden light washing over the pastoral setting, Jacob’s expressive, blushing face is captured in stunning close-up by cinematographer Nom Duczewski (who also shot the kinetic “Housekeeping for Beginners”). “DJ Ahmet” is a film made up of visual images and vibrant colour. In this corner of the world, traditional clothing is inherently flamboyant, but filmmakers enhance their impact by conceiving images to look imperceptibly dressy in the way the shapes blend in the frame.
At every turn, Unkovski’s perspicious writing finds compelling ways to illustrate the disconnect between young people tethered to a larger world than their small mountain community of Yurok people (a Turkic ethnic group) via their mobile phones and the pastoral lifestyle and deep patriarchy that still fit there. Equally, Unkovski derives his universally understood comedy from culturally specific situations. The plight of the technology-defying imam that Ahmed assists on multiple occasions is a recurring gag of side-splitting. The Microsoft Windows startup sound has never been so funny. With each perfectly timed joke, including those involving Ahmet’s lost sheep, one’s admiration for Unkovski’s artistic vision grows given the color work he accomplishes.
Neither grounded, nor emotionally light, “DJ Ahmet” is based on the realities of life in patriarchal societies where there is little room for men to react to their emotions or for women to have full agency over their lives. Unkovski bookends the film with sharp, dream-based comments by local elderly women, who discuss local affairs and encourage Ahmed from afar. Unkovski’s narrative works so that the adolescent infatuation between Ahmed and AYA serves as an empowering catalyst for challenging the conventions, whether through performing a “provocative” dance number in front of the entire population or adapting a tractor to become a mobile DJ setup.
The kind of movie that urges one to tell everyone about it so they can also be a gem with an impact on appeal. And although it ventures into territory expected in age (through burgeoning romanticism, the desire to assert one’s identity, conflict, and childishness), cultural context, and the reception of Unkovski’s innovative stories, he casts an unusual debut into the lands in one of the lands. A world of his own.
