SYNOPSIS

In a remote mountain village, young men wearing animal masks take part in a traditional bellmen ritual. Željko, behind a wild boar mask, is pulled into a tense dynamic with his dominant friend Zvone. What begins as play slowly turns into a quiet struggle for power, as Željko is pushed to prove himself. Caught between expectations of adulthood and a longing for freedom, he starts to lose control.

INTENTION

Wild Boar stems from my need to explore belonging, identity, and the threshold between youth and adulthood. Returning to a remote mountain region in western Croatia, where my family comes from, I encountered the bellmen ritual as a space where masculinity is shaped through inherited codes of strength and exclusion.

By joining local processions, I observed a tightly structured male community where identity is performed and status earned. What struck me most was the transformation under the mask. Without it, the young men are restrained; with it, they become dominant and physically uninhibited. This tension between vulnerability and aggression forms the core of the film.

Wild Boar constructs a fictional ritual world rooted in reality. For me, the masks embody instinct, fear, and social expectation. Through Željko, I follow a moment when play turns into pressure, and belonging becomes something that must be proven.

Visually, I stay close to the body, gesture, and sound, observing how a young man begins to cross a line he cannot fully understand or undo.