[WWYC] OT movie featuring ham radio

[Felix Kuntzsch]

Folks, 

Somewhat OT but perhaps of interest nonetheless: 
there’s a nice movie out there prominently featuring Ham Radio. Titled Cirkus Columbia it came out already in 2010 but as far as I know it has never received much attention in the Ham Radio community. In fact, it’s an Art House style movie and thus was never intended to become a blockbuster, I suppose. 

The story is about a young fellow who happens to hold a YU4 call and finds himself caught in the turmoil of disintegrating Yugoslavia. The story takes place in a town in Croat Herzegovina in 1991 and although there’s lot of love and politics in there, Ham Radio is present throughout. DX is the young fellow’s passion and we see him competing with his mate over the best contacts. His new antenna comes to play an important role (though it’s a VHF type of thing) and the QSL’s cards in the shack are as real as the YAESU prefix map (I contacted one of those stations whose card is visible).

I was thrilled when I saw it first since I didn’t expect that Ham Radio would feature in there – it was by Tanovic and on the Balkans so I gave it a go. Those not so familiar with the intricacies of Balkan politics in the 1990s and in particular the Bosnian conundrum might find it somewhat opaque at one point or another but the overall story still makes it worth watching.

Check it out!


Felix, DL7FER op at DF0HQ/DL0UM