This short by Stevan Miskovic has just been re-discovered, and restored by the Jugoslovenska Kinoteka, after spending the last 80 years in the shadows. It's a silent film, boasting the merits of the Yugoslav national lottery at the time, the lottery of Vasic Brothers.

In 1928, Yugoslavia was still known as the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, as one of the film's title cards indicates. It was to become the Kingdom of Yugoslavia the following year, under the dictatorship of Alexander I (1888-1934). The country at the time boasted some three hundred motion-picture theatres, and its production was made up mainly of shorts, propaganda films such as Sreća, and newsreels. The national cinema, backed up by a mere handful of pioneers, was thus only at its very beginnings, while the country's screens were monopolised by foreign films. One had to await 1932 for legislation to favour national productions, which then began to soar. In 1933, distributors forced the repeal of this law, and American cinema once more reigned in Yugoslav theatres.

Respecting the codes of silent movies, the eyes of the actors in this short are heavily made up to highlights their features and expressions. On the other hand, Tom, the black character, wears no make-up, and despite his somewhat stereotypical first name, he takes his place in a completely natural way in the story alongside his fellows. It's an element surprising for this era, dominated by an American cinema subject to segregationist laws. If, however, a film showed a black character, the latter was played by a white actor, wearing dark make-up for the role. A famous example of this is the jazz singer, played by Al Jolson (1886-1950) in the film of the same name, considered to be the first "talkie" in motion-picture history.