The Third Half

Peace Corps service is full of unexpected challenges and surprises, but I never imagined it would lead to my first film debut.

The 85^th Academy Awards ceremony (The Oscars) is nearly upon us, with Seth MacFarlane (creator of Family Guy) set to host the event this Sunday, February 24^th with a special tribute to the 50^thanniversary of the James Bond film series (enter theme music). Every country can submit one entry for best Foreign Language film. Macedonia’s official entry for this year is a very special one. While it did not make it into the final top five nominees, it did make it into my top picks for must-see Macedonian movies. Not only do a few fellow PCVs and I make an appearance in the film, it’s a compelling story based on true events.

Football (not of the American sort) is the main star of this newest film from Macedonia’s award-winning director Darko Mitrevski. The Third Half (2012) is based on a true story about FC (Football Club) Macedonia and its German-Jewish coach who led the team towards a trying victory in the Nazi football league during the turbulent time of World War II. It’s a story in which football brings lovers together across ethnic and religious lines, unites Macedonians against tensions of a new Nazi regime, and becomes more than just a game – it’s a battlefield between good and evil.

The film premiered in Macedonia in late 2012 with a red carpet event during the International Film Festival in Bitola, followed by a premiere in Skopje. It has been circulating movie theater circuits that debut international films, so if you see it advertised, it’s worth watching. It’s filmed at sites in both America and Macedonia, thus language switches from English to Macedonian with English subtitles. You can hear the Macedonian language, and get a fascinating history lesson while you’re at it.

The film features a unique cast. Macedonian model (and new face of Victoria’s Secret) Katarina Ivanovska makes her film debut in the main role of Rebecca, a well-to-do Jewish woman residing in Macedonia who escapes the horrific fate of her people by eloping with a Macedonian football player and living in the team’s locker room under the stadium. The actor who plays Rebecca’s father is Croatian-American actor Don Rafael, who you may recognize from one of his many roles in major Hollywood films including Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Eyes Wide Shut, and more recently,In the Land of Blood and Honey. A German actor by the name of Richard Sammel, known for his role in Roberto Begnini’s Life is Beautiful plays Spitz, the Jewish-German coach that revives FC Macedonia. German-Nazi commander Garvanoff is played by Emil Ruben, a Macedonian actor of Jewish origin. Last, but not least, in the final scene of the film you can catch a glimpse of my fellow PCVs and me smiling back at you.

While visiting Skopje for our first time two months after arriving in Macedonia in 2011, a group of us PCVs were asked by the film’s directors to be in a photo-shoot for the film. We are the American family in the photo that main character Rebecca holds up while paying respects to her deceased family members at the newly opened Holocaust Museum in Skopje. Rebecca has returned to Macedonia nearly 70 years after surviving the holocaust, and that picture of us PCVs as her American family and living descendants is symbolic of the incredible perseverance of life in the face of devastating loss. The behind the scenes section of the movie’s website (www.thethirdhalf-movie.com) features poignant interviews with the last living player of FC Macedonia, as well as with Neta Koen, the woman whose life story inspired this film.

The photographers after the photo shoot.  Skopje, Fall 2011