{"id":128113,"date":"2025-09-10T17:56:10","date_gmt":"2025-09-10T17:56:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/128113\/"},"modified":"2025-09-10T17:56:10","modified_gmt":"2025-09-10T17:56:10","slug":"a-thriller-from-the-co-writer-of-a-serbian-film","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/128113\/","title":{"rendered":"A Thriller From the Co-Writer of A Serbian Film"},"content":{"rendered":"

While the voice of God<\/a> can take many forms, few would probably expect it to come via a vengeful, crass, edgelord Buddha who communicates exclusively through butt-dial. And yet that\u2019s exactly how the deity avails itself to Yelena (Jelena Dokic), the protagonist of the vivacious but exhausting \u201cKarmadonna<\/a>.\u201d Directed by \u201cA Serbian Film<\/a>\u201d co-writer Aleksandar Radivojevic, the movie is thrilling at its most pulpy, and while it offers intriguing commentary around the futility of divine power in a world that has been shaped to serve the needs of the most powerful, like a long-winded dinner blessing its continued meandering can make you forget about its substance.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"'Little<\/a> \"'Demon<\/a> <\/p>\n

We\u2019ve seen any number of stories about an ordinary civilian pushed to her violent limits, but the added spiritual dimension to Yelena\u2019s grueling odyssey is enough to make \u201cKarmadonna\u201d feel novel. When Yelena first gets (literally) called upon by the unholy force, she remains skeptical of who\u2019s speaking with her as her mind is preoccupied with caring for her expectant child. It isn\u2019t until she witnesses a possessed child run and slam his face into a nearby tree that she realizes the voice at the other end of the line might just be omnipotent. The deity \u2014 named Siddharta (Sergej Trifunovi\u0107), and hilariously self-described as \u201cthe creator of content\u201d \u2014\u00a0conscripts her to kill a list of individuals or else he\u2019ll slay Yelena\u2019s unborn child in the womb. Yelena begrudgingly agrees, and from the start, this decision is a clever lift on religious iconography, as if Mother Mary took up arms against the Roman forces herself instead of letting her Son be crucified.\u00a0<\/p>\n

To her credit, Jelena never plays Yelena as someone whose fright destabilizes her. She may be new to the whole agent of vengeance gig, but she onboards quickly, and the joy is witnessing her go from begrudging participant to mirthful executioner. At the start, she understandably feels that going on a killing spree may not be what\u2019s best for her child\u2019s health, but she quickly gets on board with dispensing judgment once she interacts with the unsavory characters she\u2019s asked to dispatch, from a brutish cab driver who harasses her to a predatory author who uses his influence to manipulate underage women into service. \u00a0<\/p>\n

Indeed, what Yelena is such a compelling character because her caution and desperation are forever at war. It\u2019s not only that murder is decidedly not her speciality, but unlike your Odenkirks<\/a>, Reeves<\/a>, or Patels<\/a>, her pregnancy ensures she can\u2019t afford to take the hits the other cinematic hitmen have readily invited. It\u2019s that tactfulness of needing to protect her body and fully commit to her vengeance that makes for exciting viewing, as the stakes only increase with each new antagonist, and the margin of safety dwindles from minuscule to nonexistent.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Likewise, Trifunovi\u0107\u2019s voice performance as the devil in her ear is worth noting, as the Serbian actor\u2019s lines never feel phoned in. He goes on diatribes like a spoiled CEO, but his sardonic tantrums also get at a deeper truth. When Yelena asks why he doesn\u2019t murder the names himself, Noah\u2019s Ark style, Siddharta quips that the forces of globalization (\u201ccorporations, globalists, the one percent\u201d) make it difficult to intervene directly. Indeed, when the most powerful can reshape the world in the ways they see fit and view themselves as deities, that leaves little room for true spirituality or hallowed justice to have a fighting chance against such systems. Even the most well-meaning of people have their good intentions curdle into cruelty when reflected through the prism of corporate life. \u201cYou taught me to hate you,\u201d Siddharta says of humanity as a whole; a sobering truth that we\u2019re more than capable of justifying our own destruction. In truth, Siddharta requires Yelena\u2019s services to dispatch these particular men as their \u201cmetaphysical armor\u201d protects them; a type of karmic payback, and you can practically hear the embarrassment at this humiliation laced between his every barking order.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The film is fairly straightforward in that it\u2019s about Yelena carving her way through a progressively worse list of people in violently creative ways (dollar bills, shot glasses, and crucifixes are just a few of the items plunged into sweaty bodies). You can feel the film straining to maintain its momentum, and \u0110or\u0111e Miljenovi\u0107\u2019s score pushes the action along with an urgency that reflects a fear of boredom more than anything; at several points when Yelena is dispatching a victim, the music crescendos to a vociferous pitch, as if to draw attention to itself instead of the epic setpiece that\u2019s unfolding.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In the hands of cinematographer Aleksandar Jakonic, the camera doesn\u2019t move so much as it prances. Jakonic likes his dolly shots, and in a way that evokes Sam Raimi\u2019s \u201cEvil Dead\u201d films, the camera tromps about with the freedom of a vengeful spirit, unafraid to get up close to its characters\u2019 bloodied, burnt, and sliced-up visages. At the same time, the film\u2019s lens is always eager to expand perspective for a mordantly humorous effect. Take a sequence where Siddhartha can control two henchmen of an entertainment tycoon and forces them to bash their heads until one of their skulls cracks: While Yelena infiltrates the compound, her skirmishes are interrupted by the two men continually running at each other, and it\u2019s hilarious to witness her try to circumnavigate her way into a compound while evading the head-butting men.<\/p>\n

\u201cKarmadonna\u201d is fairly simple in this way, with occasional detours into the lives of other characters like Siddharta\u2019s son Bane (Milos Lolic), but it\u2019s mainly about Yelena, the vengeance quest she\u2019s been conscripted towards, and the bodies left behind in her wake. It\u2019s off-putting and not exactly pleasant viewing, but there\u2019s some apt appeal in its refusal for easy agreeability. Sometimes, we dig ourselves into holes that even the devil won\u2019t follow us through.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Grade: B-<\/p>\n

\u201cKarmadonna\u201d premiered at the 2025 Toronto International Film Festival. It is currently seeking U.S. distribution.<\/p>\n

Want to stay up to date on IndieWire\u2019s film\u00a0reviews<\/a>\u00a0and critical thoughts?\u00a0Subscribe here<\/a>\u00a0to our newly launched newsletter, In Review by David Ehrlich, in which our Chief Film Critic and Head Reviews Editor rounds up the best new reviews and streaming picks along with some exclusive musings \u2014\u00a0all only available to subscribers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"While the voice of God can take many forms, few would probably expect it to come via a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":128114,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[96,2332,14158,2839,129,14160,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-128113","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-entertainment","tag-film","tag-karmadonna","tag-movies","tag-reviews","tag-tiff","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128113","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=128113"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128113\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/128114"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=128113"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=128113"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=128113"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}