De Facto

Anyone who wishes to gaze into the depths of the human lust for destruction should be aware that it is necessary to maintain a distance towards it. In investigating such unimaginable horror, Selma Doborac’s De Facto avails itself of two basic concepts: abstraction and minimalism. It thereby becomes possible to render the unutterable – cast in the form of statements of oppressive detachment – utterable, without making it comprehensible, abused for temporary thrills and thus ‘normalised’. The harm that we inflict upon one another is starkly portrayed here. For her second feature-length film, Selma Doborac turns her attention to a difficult question: How can cinema grapple with perpetrators, extreme violence, state terror and testimonies relating to these without conniving with them?