An Episode in the Life of an Iron Picker

• Nazif Mujić: Nazif
• Senada Alimanovic: Senada
• Sandra Mujić: Sandra
• Šemsa Mujić: Šemsa

From the Life of a scrap collector ( Bosnian: Epizoda u životu Beraca željeza ) is an award winning Bosnian -French- Slovenian feature film of 2013.

Action

Nazif lives with his family in a poor Roma settlement and lives by collecting scrap. Then his wife Senada has pain and bleeding must go to a hospital the family. They will tell them that Senada had a miscarriage and 980 Mark needed to treat now. Since the family does not have much money and Senada no insurance card, they must not be operated on. A second attempt fails and Senada is discouraged. Meanwhile, the power is turned off in the settlement, since no one has paid for it. Nazif now asks the mother to help with the insurance card and the sister in law, a new attempt is started at another hospital. The trick works and Senada is operated and thus saved their lives. With the proceeds from the scrap his car Nazif can pay the electricity and medicine for his wife.

Background

The story of the film is based on a fact, and was shot with the real family in their real environment with a budget of 17,000 euros. Nazif Mujić received about 1300 euros for 26 days of shooting. The film premiered at the Berlin Film Festival in 2013 and was awarded two Silver Bears.

The family drove to Berlin in November 2013 to apply for asylum there, because they are still discriminated against in their homeland and also health problems endangering their existence. The application was initially rejected.

Awards

• Silver Bear / Grand Jury Prize at the Berlinale 2013
• Silver Bear / Best Actor at the Berlinale 2013 Nazif Mujić