director’s statement

There are lots of questions and answers arising from thinking about the relativity of human freedom that every one of us can find in their personal experience. From your early childhood you are tamed and learned how to live your life, what is acceptable behavior and what is a proper road to take if one wants to become a decent person. When you are a child you are trained like a pet by a system of rewards and punishments. You feel good each time you are rewarded and so go on doing what others expect from you. You try to meet the expectations of your parents, teachers and bosses by pretending to be someone else. You lose your own self and completely embrace the version of your personality that is supposed to be morally acceptable by different cultural patterns and so become a person similar to others and the one they all expect you to be. Then you go on taming yourself following the system of rewards and punishments you already accepted. You become a robot that lives in delusion and falsely believes to have your own will and freedom to make decisions. And one day, when you become a parent yourself, you start controlling and taming your children the same way.

The Same is a film that presents a jail as a metaphor for the system that prevents us from making our own decisions based upon our wishes, thoughts and beliefs. It is the system that erases the unique personality of an individual, the system that regulates our behavior by imposing punishments, the system that hinders and forbids.

This is a story about the relativity of personal freedom, making decisions based upon others’ expectations and the loss of the all-important feeling of individuality.

It was filmed in Penal Correctional Facility in Sremska Mitrovica, Penal Correctional Facility in Požarevac – Zabela, Penal Correctional Facility for Women in Požarevac and Penal Correctional Facility in Niš.