It was very hard to revisit a part of my life in the In the Land of Blood and Honey movie, which I thought had been buried deep down in my soul. To go back to where we were, twenty years ago, it was painful. I knew it would open up old wounds.
We met a couple months before the In the Land of Blood and Honey filming started. Angelina Jolie said, "Whatever you want, just ask for it." So we sat down and talked about it. She was great from the beginning, saying that this is essentially a story of my kind, my experience, my war, my country. In a way, she was giving us blank check to fill in the emotional landscape and do our best, really. She was really supportive and kind and open and creative.
What was important was to trust - to be led through the dark by Angelina Jolie and then being touched by Zana Marjanovic, and doing the same for them. I'm so happy, and I'm so glad - this is the quality that makes The Land of Blood and Honey what it is - that in all these difficult scenes where I'm naked, not just physically but emotionally, we were able to achieve, without rehearsals, by just exploring the space.
I can't possibly be objective about myself. I can look at my other colleagues work, and they are all tremendous, really. To see their faces, to see their expressions, to see how they were sitting in their chair uncomfortably, and start crying even, is a great testament to what film can achieve.
