The Promising Boy 1981

Slobodan Milošević is a twenty-four-year-old with the world seemingly at his feet, navigating life in early-1980s Belgrade from the vantage point of a privileged, upstanding family. He grows up as the only child of a Yugoslav People’s Army officer father and a university professor mother, and he pursues medical studies at the University of Belgrade while dating the equally poised and attractive Maša. Maša is the daughter of an influential Serbian politician and a free-spirited Slovenian mother, and the couple move within circles that blend ambition with tradition. From the outset, Slobodan appears as an attentive partner and a dutiful son, balancing respect for his elders with the charms of youth.

The opening scene sets a framework of restraint and ritual: Slobodan listens to Russian bards and chanson, all while adhering to his parents’ expectations as Maša and her parents come for a visit. The couple’s romance unfolds through a traditional dance of social gatherings with both sets of parents, and even their sexual life seems tethered to a careful, almost ceremonial order. Maša, at times playful and a touch adventurous, suggests a fearless, almost reckless experiment—one night in his yellow Volkswagen, the high school graduation gift from his parents. She candidly tells him that she has placed an intrauterine device as a contraceptive, a detail that underscores their youthful exploration within the boundaries of their world.

One routine day, Slobodan drives and picks up a female hitchhiker who turns out to be a foreign traveler. Clavis, a French-speaking Swiss national visiting Yugoslavia to tour medieval monasteries and frescoes, is charming and provocative, and their flirtation quickly blossoms into a plan to meet again. He drops her at Hotel Slavija, and the pair’s subsequent days unfold through museum visits and discussions of art, history, and cinema, weaving a tapestry of cultural exchange and flirtation. Their encounter culminates in a moment of intimacy in her hotel room, a charged sequence that marks a turning point for Slobodan.

A bright day at the Lido beach with Maša and their families brings a stain of suspicion: Maša’s friend has seen Slobodan entering the hotel with the Swiss traveler. The evidence—a hickey on his neck—sparks a heated confrontation, and Maša strikes him with a paddle, knocking him unconscious for a moment. When he regains his senses, he wades into the Danube and swims across, barefoot and disheveled. He then trudges to Hotel Slavija, his resolve alight with something new, but hotel security denies him entry. The thrill of this escapade seems to awaken Slobodan to a different life, and he even chooses to reinvent his appearance, stepping into a barber’s chair to shave off his beard as Pekinška Patka’s energetic tempo fills the air with a sign that changes are afoot.

This moment signals a broader upheaval. Slobodan stops returning home and begins crashing in dorm rooms around the Studentski Grad residence, alarming his parents and Maša who report him missing to the police. A dormitory altercation leads to a rough night on benches at the train station, and the police escort him home, where his already tense father explodes in anger. In a tense confrontation, Slobodan blocks his father’s outburst with a sharp retort:

Don’t you ever do that again, daddy

The outburst intensifies when his father throws him out, and Slobodan wheels away in his car, later cashing it in for a motorbike—an emblem of his desire for speed and escape.

He later visits Maša’s apartment only to learn she has left for Greece with her father. Undeterred, Slobodan pursues her mother, engaging in a complicated and uneasy romantic encounter with her. The mature, motherly tone she sometimes adopts gives way to a harsher, more personal reaction as she tries to steer the situation back toward stability, only to be met with Slobodan’s caustic humor and defiance. The next morning, she makes him breakfast in bed, plays a Bulat Okudzhava record, and tries to discuss the limits of their relationship, which he interrupts with a cruel jab and a rebellious exit. He drives away, starting a new soundtrack in his life with a Šarlo Akrobata track in the car and a newly found appetite for risk, even as he begins to fantasize about a different future—one that involves a motorcycle and a new scene.

As Slobodan’s lifestyle shifts, he abandons the sense of a conventional path and dives deeper into the emergent rock and punk-inspired music culture of Belgrade. He starts frequenting SKC (Student Cultural Center) and the burgeoning new-wave scene, where he meets Ljubica, who guides him toward connections with people who could help him shape a future in music. At a private party hosting a live performance by VIS Idoli, Slobodan is introduced to Pit, a key moment as Pit is drawn to Slobodan’s lyrics and the raw energy he brings to the room. The night marks a fusion of personal rebellion with artistic potential, a convergence that hints at the beginnings of a new artistic direction in Slobodan’s life.

This is a story of adolescence crossing into adulthood, of a young man navigating the pressures of family, love, and ambition while the cultural tides of Belgrade in the early 1980s push him toward a nonlinear path. It is a portrait of a life in flux, where personal impulses clash with social expectations, and where music, art, and a restless curiosity about the world pull at the seams of a carefully constructed existence. The narrative keeps its focus on the evolving dynamics of Slobodan’s relationships and the choices that begin to redefine who he might become, rooted in the characters who shape his world and the cultural milieu that surrounds him.