Critics reviews

There is relentless, dread-fueled suspense here, and a kind of procedural efficiency that reminds me of Paul Greengrass’s fact-based films, like “Bloody Sunday” and “United 93.” The rigorous honesty of “Quo Vadis, Aida?” is harrowing, partly because it subverts many of the expectations that quietly attach themselves to movies about historical trauma... [an] unforgettable film.

Zbanic’s masterful directorial prowess is on full display throughout, with such a large number of extras being shot with a handheld camera, while the screenplay functions both in service of historical accuracy and maintaining the spotlight on this heroine. For the viewer, the film has a heart rate-rising effect that’s almost unbearable in its potency.

the details somehow never blur in “Quo Vadis, Aida?,” which manages to hold background and foreground in unsettling balance for 102 taut, terrifying minutes... “Quo Vadis, Aida?” re-creates history in the present tense, with a gut-clutching immediacy that Žbanić makes bearable through sheer formal restraint: This is a movie about the murders of more than 8,000 Bosnian Muslims, mostly boys and men, in which graphic violence is never shown and yet the worst is never remotely in doubt.

It’s a despairing, nay, devastating piece of work that leaves one drained, exhausted, appalled and admiring... Zbanic’s immersive technique plunges you into the thick of the nightmare, even as it chooses to avoid the explicitness of the slaughter.

Taut and intense, this is the kind of film that a critic hopes finds a broad enough audience to provoke conversation and insight about how we fix these broken systems. It truly feels like Zbanic’s work here could effect change if seen by the right people.

In the hands of writer-director Jasmila Žbanić... this horrifying tale is lent a profoundly human heart, ensuring that we keep on watching, a notable achievement for a movie that is centrally concerned with the spectre of looking away.

An icily brilliant and overwhelmingly convincing attempt to tackle, head-on, this shameful atrocity: shameful for the UN, the European Union and all those western world leaders who had been reluctant to intervene... After 25 years, the time has come to look again at the horror of Srebrenica, and Zbanic has done this with clear-eyed compassion and candour.

Žbanic builds tension slowly, never dropping the pressure but allowing the characters (and audience) room to breathe amongst the chaos... It’s an elegant way to tell a war story that preserves the characters’ humanity, but make the inevitable tragic ending all the more devastating.

Compelling, harrowing and heartbreaking... This is a fiercely impressive recreation of impossible dilemmas that should never have arisen, a situation that never should have happened and a human catastrophe that must never be forgotten.

Words, not action, rule "Quo Vadis, Aida?" And that the film still turns into an indelible tour de force, locking one into state of soul-crushing turmoil, is a testament to the astounding writing, editing, and acting that sustains it... Jasna Duričić is the film's crowning glory,

Zbanic’s expert telling is simple and to the point, relying on the audience’s empathy with the anguished interpreter to reach the heart of darkness in this tragic story... The subject is horrifying but the screen is hard to look away from, as the situation becomes a powder keg of tension.