World War II · Film · 1973
Battle of Sutjeska
Sutjeska
Tito's exhausted Partisans, resting in the Durmitor mountains, are surrounded by a vastly larger Axis force and must break out across the Sutjeska gorge in a month-long fight for survival.
Where it happened
Follow the story across 2 places.
Stop 1: Durmitor mountains, Montenegro
The Partisans' brief rest in the mountains ends as Axis divisions close in from every side.
Stop 2: Sutjeska valley at Tjentište, Bosnia
Key location
Commanders and ordinary fighters alike are thrown into a desperate breakout across the river and up the mountain slopes.
What really happened
Only weeks after the Neretva, the Axis launched Case Black, the Fifth Enemy Offensive, on 15 May 1943: more than 120,000 German, Italian, Bulgarian and Croatian troops against about 22,000 Partisans encircled around the Durmitor massif in Montenegro. Tito's main force fought its way north across the Sutjeska river and through the Zelengora mountains into eastern Bosnia by mid-June.
The breakout cost the Partisans heavy losses, including many wounded who could not be carried, and Tito himself was wounded by a bomb on 9 June 1943. Richard Burton plays Tito in this state-backed epic, which Yugoslavia submitted for the Academy Awards; the battlefield at Tjentište is now a memorial park.
Where to watch
Checking streaming services…
Full details
- Original title
- Sutjeska
- Directed by
- Stipe Delić
- Countries
- Serbia
- Languages
- Serbian (Latin), German
- Released
- 1973
- Period
- –
- Theaters of war
- Mediterranean & Africa
- Themes
- Combat
- Resistance
- True story
