Principal photography on Serbian-German-French-Dutch co-production CiviLife is due to start in Belgrade on June 22 for eight weeks.

The dark comedy about a Serbian black-market gangster shooting down an American pilot during the NATO bombing of Belgrade in 1999 is written and will be directed by Milos Radovic.

Radovic enjoyed international recognition with short films Sudden And Premature Death Of Colonel K.K. (Iznenadna I Prerana Smrt Pukovnika K.K.) which won the Jury Prize in Cannes in 1987 and My Country (Moja Domovina) which scooped a number international awards in 1997 and 1998, including the Short Film Grand Prizes at Montpellier and Manhattan.

Last year the project was awarded Euros 280,000 by Eurimages with additional backing expected from the Serbian Film Fund.

CiviLife is co-produced by Serbian company Zillion (owned by actor-producer Lazar Ristovski who also stars), German Michael Eckelt's Neue Impuls, Dutch Roketa Film and French Mact Production. Antoine de Clermont-Tonnerre, owner of Mact, previously co-produced Yugoslav films: Someone Else's America (Tudja Amerika) (1995) and Powder Keg (Bure Baruta) (1998), both directed by Goran Paskaljevic.

Besides Ristovski, the cast includes Branka Katic, Miki Manojlovic, Olivera Markovic, Nikola Pejakovic and British actor Simon Lyndon.