If Neda Arnerić was born somewhere in the world, she would be Brižit Bardo

"If Neda Arnerić was born somewhere in the world, she would be Brigitte Bardot", wrote the actor Rade Serbedzija in his memory of the famous domestic and international actress, the sex symbol of Yugoslav cinema, whose rich acting career lasted half a century.

These words, among other things, were heard at the promotion of the author's monograph "Miraculous Melancholia". Anita Pavić, which was presented in Bijelo Polje, with whom he had a conversation Edin Smailović.

Neda Arnerić got her first role when she was only 13 years old, in the movie "San" Purise Đorđevića, so that at the age of 15, in the teenage hit "Višnja na Tašmajdan", she became a real local star.

"Her acting talent and charisma on the big screen were noticed at an early age by foreigners, and an international career quickly followed. However, Neda made the decision that she does not need big money and world fame and remains in her country. Numerous awards are proof of her commitment as an actor, the most significant of which are the Silver and Gold Arena in Pula and the 'Pavla Vujisić' Lifetime Achievement Award", said Smailović, adding that the book consists of eight chapters in which Panić presented the life and work of one of the greatest film stars. actress of the former Yugoslavia and Serbia.

As the author pointed out, the monograph, on 270 pages enriched with three hundred photographs, evokes the life and work of a great film star who, in a career spanning almost half a century, played about 40 theater plays and more than a hundred films.

The decision to write a monograph about Neda, said Pavić, is a logical continuation, after the completed book about Milena Dravič.

Few people know that Neda was also a graduate art historian and that she was engaged in gallery work, where she got to know her better, following numerous artists who passed through her gallery in Simina Street in Belgrade. There she discovered how humble Neda was.

"This is evidenced by the fact that, despite being equally successful and famous in theater, film and television, she was very surprised when, during a chat over coffee in her apartment, I told her that, after Milena Dravić, in in almost all of whose films she acted as an actress ten years younger, she is next in line to write a monograph. She looked at me with those wonderful penetrating eyes and said: 'Do you think I deserve such a good monograph, like yours about Milena?' Today, I hope that this monograph is worthy of one Neda Arnerić", said Pavić.

Although she had a long career of more than five decades, despite great fame, Neda, Pavić reveals, constantly harbored some kind of doubt in herself, whether what she was doing was good enough and whether she now deserved something like that.

Neda, the author reminds, was a top actress, who spoke four world languages, and she, unlike Milena Dravić, also had a serious international career, playing with the biggest directors in France, Italy, America...

She worked on the monograph for about a year and a half, encountering various obstacles, which she overcame thanks to persistence.

"Whenever you are in front of the white paper, you are always in a big dilemma, fear and doubt, because you have an incredible career ahead of you. You are wondering what to put between the two covers, and to include the whole life, because Neda Arnerić was equally successful in all three fields - theater, television and film.

Although she started acting very early, that way of life was, at the same time, a big burden on the weak shoulders of a girl, as the actress herself testifies:

"I didn't play with my friends from the area,... I never crossed the last one."

"Her childhood was completely cut short, and at the age of 13 she entered a very serious world of adults, staying in various hotel rooms around the world, filming movies," notes Pavić.

Neda played in her first play at the age of 15, in the "Boško Buha" theater, and around the age of 14-15 she also acted in serious TV dramas.

Pavić also drew attention to Neda's notable episodic role in the film, then a hit, "The Love Life of Budimir Trajković", directed by Dejan Karaklajić, whom she married when she was 22 years old, and it was precisely this circumstance that was crucial to her not getting a bigger role.

In Macedonia, she shot as many as five films that were very successful, among them the most notable is "Straighten Up, Delfina", which was based on a true event about a marathon runner. Atina Bojadži, the only Yugoslav woman who swam the English Channel.

"Anita herself was delighted with her acting. It is also interesting that Neda was a great professional. For that film, she took swimming lessons, learned to swim marathons, entered icy waters in order to play the role as faithfully as possible", she says.

In the monograph, 30 eminent people from the world of film, theater and television talk about Neda, among them: Lordan Zavranović, whose two films are the most important for her career, Milan Jelić, Svetozar Cvetković, Rade Šerbedžija, Milica Kralj, Meto Jovanovski, Kole Angelovski, and many others, and there is also a valuable chapter with film critics, who spoke about Neda.

It's strange that Neda didn't have any photos of herself. Pavić explains this by the fact that all the clippings and headlines from newspapers, which her mother carefully collected for four decades, disappeared in a suspicious way during one move to another apartment.

"An actor Miodrag Krivokapić told that Neda, when she was in the spotlight of world fame, after he invited her to act in a play in Banja Luka, after a long silence on the other end of the telephone line, said to him: "Thank you for remembering me", which again it testifies to the life of an actor, who makes, say, a movie, they have huge awards, but they have no continuity, but, for example, they don't make anything for three years. And at that time, no one thought of her for acting in the theater, and that invitation meant a lot to her," says the author.

It bothered Neda Arnerić that everyone looked at her as a sex symbol and she said that she was an actress, that she was just doing her job. In one of the quotes, which permeates the entire biography of Ned, he states: "All my life I was seen from the angle of the camera where they thought I should be photographed as beautiful, and I longed to play Antigone, and some old lady with a mustache and eyebrows and to show how much of a character actress I am, not that I'm a sex symbol and beautiful."

Anita Panić is a long-time television author, documentarian and writer. She started her career at Radio Belgrade as the author of cultural programs. For more than two decades, she worked at Television Belgrade, and as a screenwriter and director, she produced over a hundred documentary shows and films, for which she was awarded at international festivals. She is a member of the Association of Film Artists of Serbia and works as a freelance artist. Panić also wrote monographs about actors Milena Dravić and Peter the King.

A small number of actors and actresses shine for so long, and an even smaller number die out at their own heart's desire

Neda's acting biography is impressive, but Neda was, above all, a great person, ready to help others, to give them their space when they find themselves in life's adversities, and above all, a humble person.

Although the monograph did not deal with her private life, but exclusively with her professional life, the book is permeated with the observations of her colleagues who described her as a wonderful and modest person.

No matter how magical a person she was, Neda always carried with her some melancholy, some sadness that defined her personality, hence the title of the book, taken from the title of director Miloš Miša Radivojević.

"With Neda, love and friendship were at a higher price than her movie fame, and she bravely paid that price. That magical melancholy, which she wore on her beautiful face and body throughout the films, was less the result of ambition and acting technique, and more of real deep emotions.

A small number of top actresses and actors shine for so long, and an even smaller number of them die out at their own heart's desire," wrote the famous director.

During the promotion of the monograph published by the Film Center of Serbia, inserts from famous productions with Neda Arnerić such as - "Afternoon", "Who is singing there", "Straighten up, Delfina", "Deceitful summer '68", "Love life" were also shown. Budimir Trajković", "Hello, the party of whores", "A little, a lot of passion", as well as "Višnja na Tašmajdan" (1968).

When you act, you have to jump into the icy river 20 times

What is the downside of that profession are precisely such difficult roles, as Milena Dravić testified.

"Milena told me, recalling the shooting of the film "Battle on the Neretva", how difficult it is to be an actor. - When you want to prove yourself, and you work with great directors, there is nothing there, you have to jump into the icy river. If he doesn't like it, you have 20 doubles, you jump into the river 20 times... that's the acting craft", said Milena Dravić.

She heard from Milena that many of her young colleagues got pneumonia that way, and that many of them could not have children afterwards.

"But it's a great sacrifice and a great commitment to work, and Neda was one of those dedicated people, and when you see her films, you realize the incredible range of gorgeous acting talent, from the roles of a sleazy girl and a young girl, as she was in the romance "Cherries on Tašmajdan", to brilliant a role like in the movie "Evening Bells", produced by Lordan Zafranović, where she grew into a racial character actress", concluded Pavić.