Bottlemen

Amid flocks of seagulls and bulldozers, the “Bottlemen” fish tons of plastic bottles daily for recycling from the largest open landfill site in Europe, on the outskirts of Belgrade.
The camera shifts between dusty close-ups and epic panoramas that reveal the toxic vastness of the place.
It quickly becomes clear that the seemingly chaotic hustle and bustle actually follows a certain order, rooted in tradition and hierarchy.
At the center is the Roma man Yanika, who aspires to become the leader of his work crew.
Powerful, ethnographic observations of daily labor life are interwoven with intimate insights into the lives of the Bottlemen in a rundown Roma settlement — far from any aestheticization of poverty.
A raw, unvarnished look at a toxic environment and a toxic male world, turning into a contemporary document of our times.
With the construction of a waste incineration plant, the days of the landfill — and of the Bottlemen — are numbered.
(Jörg Markowitsch)

Vienna Premiere