Metastases

In the lingering haze of post‑war Zagreb, the city feels both familiar and fractured, its streets echoing with the distant rumble of unresolved conflict. The film paints the urban landscape with a stark, almost clinical palette, using the metaphor of a spreading disease to suggest that the social scars of the recent past have become an endemic malaise. Amid the clamor of daily life, football chants rise from local taverns, offering a fleeting sense of unity that disguises deeper divisions.

Krpa is the volatile nucleus of the group—a former soldier turned football hooligan whose aggression is as much a shield as it is a weapon. Filip returns home after years of treatment abroad, his attempts at normalcy constantly undermined by the pull of old habits and the expectations of a family desperate for stability. Kizo, battling alcoholism, carries the quiet weight of loss, finding brief solace in the care of stray cats that wander his modest apartment. Dejo, caught between his mixed heritage and the lingering prejudices of a society still healing from ethnic strife, wrestles with his own dependence while navigating the fragile bonds of friendship.

Together they form an unlikely quartet bound by loyalty to Dinamo Zagreb and a shared reliance on the escapism found in the city’s nocturnal corners. Their interactions flicker between camaraderie and confrontation, each conversation a micro‑cosm of the larger cultural tensions that persist in Croatia’s streets. The atmosphere is thick with a blend of gritty realism and lyrical melancholy, as the characters drift through a world where hope is as battered as the old stadium seats they occupy.

The film’s tone remains unflinching, juxtaposing moments of dark humor with an undercurrent of dread, inviting viewers to contemplate how a generation inherits the unresolved wounds of war. In this portrait of survival, the audience is left to ponder whether the characters can ever truly escape the invisible contagion that shadows their lives.

Last Updated: October 11, 2025 at 19:40