Željko Vukičević 2024 4 min UK
Kinoteka Zlatna Vrata September 12 — September 16, 2025 09:00
A subversive homage to Dušan Makavejev and Isidore Isou, OPEN UP THAT ROBOT unfolds as a sensual, absurdist manifesto. A woman eats a soft, shelled egg, sucks a shoelace, and shares a cooked egg—mouth to mouth—with a director. Between these gestures, slogans flare like cinematic sabotage: commands to misread, dismantle, and reprogram.
A call to embrace the glitch, where breakdown births invention.
Zeljko Vukicevic, known as Zhel, is a filmmaker and multidisciplinary artist whose work explores the interplay of film sound, ethics, and media spectatorship. His films delve into themes of anticipation and memory, often recontextualizing narratives to challenge conventional storytelling.
Zhel’s recent film series, Here They Come: The First, The Second, and The Third (2020–2022), has been screened at international festivals, earning acclaim for its innovative approach to sound and image. His short films have been archived by the British Film Institute as part of the One Minute programme, and he received awards for Best Video and Best New Director at the 9th DHF in Zagreb.
With a master’s degree in film theory from ARU University in Cambridge and doctoral research in film ethics, Zhel combines academic insight with experimental practice. Originally from Pula, Croatia, he has lived in the UK since 1999, continuously pushing boundaries in contemporary filmmaking.