10/03/2025 - Thea Gajić makes her feature debut with a film based on the heartfelt yet heartbreaking true story of her own father, an immigrant to the UK who fled Yugoslavia

UK writer-director Thea Gajić makes her feature debut with Surviving Earth [+see also:
interview: Thea Gajić, Slavko Sobin
film profile], which has just celebrated its world premiere in SXSW’s Narrative Spotlight competition. Having fled to Bristol from the former Yugoslavia years ago, Vlad (Slavko Sobin) is an addict-turned-drug counsellor who wants nothing else than to maintain a good relationship with his grown-up daughter Maria (Olive Gray) and get big playing harmonica in his Balkan band with his friend Misko (Stuart Martin). These are humble goals, one could say, but things grow difficult as he begins to suffer from financial troubles – his mother and brother back in Serbia further pressure him for money – and his ambitions grow bigger than he can feasibly maintain, leading him into a downward spiral linked to past trauma.

DoP Olan Collardy (best known for his work on the standout indie rom-com Rye Lane [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile]) visually brings us into a tale that takes Vlad seriously by creating a sense of drama without using an overly glossy style. However, we also get a sense of vibrancy through the joyful Balkan music by Hugo Brijs that accompanies proceedings. The movie is based on the true story of Gajić’s father, and the credits dedicate the work to the memory of the real-life Vladimir Gajić and Mychajlo "Misko" David Czerkas, the bandmate from the film. At the end of the day, Surviving Earth is simply representative of stories of regular people who struggle to balance life’s everyday challenges (hence the film’s title) – not merely the plight of immigrants. Embedded within it is also a story of a mental-health crisis and his struggles with addiction not absorbed seriously by those around him, as well as the institutions in which he dwells, although it remains difficult to penetrate this narrative until closer to the end.

As hard as it is to make this critique given the story’s inspiration from Gajić’s own accounts, Surviving Earth often fails to capture the urgency of Vlad’s haunted past deriving from personal wounds – or have us rooting fully for his band’s goals. The film doesn’t necessarily downplay the extent to which Vlad is struggling, per se, but the emotional profoundness of crucial moments is not sufficiently conveyed. For instance, his grandmother’s precious harmonica being broken by careless partygoers is clearly an incredibly devastating moment for our hero, but the focus of the storytelling doesn’t capture the gravitas of the tragedy. Likewise, we learn that he is a former drug user through his work counselling recovering addicts, but the dangers of his own relapse are not made abundantly clear.

Gajić further flirts with the idea of ethnopolitical tensions within the group, including provocation from Zlatan (Toni Gojanović), who challenges Vlad’s past loyalties, accusing him of fighting for Serbia – a set of microaggressions designed to create a fight for dominance. However, this subplot is only confronted during passing moments, leaving some depth to be desired.

Surviving Earth is a UK production by My Accomplice and Sona Films. Bankside Films is handling its world sales.