WR: Mysteries of the Organism

W.R.: Mysteries of the Organism
DVD cover of the movie
Directed by	Dušan Makavejev
Produced by	Dušan Makavejev
Written by	Dušan Makavejev
Music by	Bojana Marijan
Cinematography	Aleksandar Petković Pega Popović
Edited by	Ivanka Vukasović
Release date	1971 (1971)
Running time	85 min.
Country	Yugoslavia West Germany
Language	Serbo-Croatian English

W.R.: Mysteries of the Organism (Serbian: W.R. - Misterije organizma, W.R. - Мистерије организма) is a 1971 film by Serbian director Dušan Makavejev (born 1932) that explores the relationship between communist politics and sexuality, as well as presenting the controversial life and work of Austrian-American psychoanalyst Wilhelm Reich (1897–1957). The film's narrative structure is unconventional, intermixing fictional and documentary elements.

After initial screenings, both in and out of Yugoslavia, W.R. was banned in that country for the next 16 years. Makavejev was subsequently indicted there on criminal charges of "derision" towards "the state, its agencies, and representatives" after he made intemperate remarks to a West German newspaper about the ban. His exile from his home country then became permanent until the end of the regime.

The film intercuts documentary footage and clips from other films — notably the Stalinist propaganda film The Vow (1946) — with an imaginative and satirical narrative about a highly political Yugoslav woman who seduces a visiting Soviet celebrity ice skater. Despite different settings, characters and time periods, the different elements produce a single story of human sexuality and revolution through a montage effect.

The woman, Milena, violates her proletarian convictions (and rejects the sexual advances of a worker) by pursuing a Joseph Stalin-like celebrity ice skater — Vladimir Ilyich (Lenin's first and middle names) — who represents both class oppression and corruption from the West into communist beliefs. She succeeds, with difficulty, in sexual consummation, but V.I. is unable to reconcile his inner conflicts and ends the encounter by decapitating her. Distraught, V.I. sings a Russian song after the murder: "François Villon's Prayer" by Bulat Okudzhava.