“The Guests are Coming” (2026)
Filmed: November 2025
Youtube Premier Date: TBD
Festival Premier Date: TBD
A mother and her family attempt to prepare their slava, a hundreds year old Serbian family tradition, for the first time, despite having time constraints, clumsy children, and a strong will to please her ancestors.
"The Guests are Coming" was made for Natalija's Directing II (CINE 325) final project.
Check out featured Behind the Scenes Photos!
Read more about “The Guests are Coming” (2026)
Director’s Statement
In the absence of Serbian stories in our current media, “The Guests are Coming” (“Dolaze Gosti”) brings light of an old Serbian family tradition and how a family tackles celebrating it for the first time. As a love letter to my own family, this story is very based on my mother, Ljubica. Growing up, I would watch her prepare our slava all on her own. She really did feed almost a hundred people every year all on her own. Now that my brother, Mihajlo, and I have grown older, we also pitch in to help because we know how stressed my mom gets during that time of year. My whole life, my father, Milan, always taught us the importance of family and how we must always stick together. This story reflects the strength (and sometimes weaknesses) of family dynamics and how they tackle celebrating an important family tradition.
The Making of “The Guests are Coming” (2026)
I started writing this film in May of 2025, around my slava. I must have been inspired by my environment, I watched my mom prepare our slava since we inherited it when I was seven. She's gotten used to preparing now, but I know that once April rolls around, a special kind of stress is going to hit my family. I spent all summer writing the script and tweaking it to prepare for the first day of the fall semester when I would present my story for class. We had to pitch three other ideas for a film, but who cares about the other two, I was set on making "The Guests are Coming". I understood that going into this, my professor and classmates wouldn't know what a slava is and I kind of had to guide them around it. There were certain cultural nuances in the script that my professor didn't understand or the fact that my family doesn't hate each other, we're actually super close. Some of the ideas that my classmates and professor had just didn't fit the story culturally, and I get it, they have never experienced a slava before.
Preproduction was a breeze. Coming off of "I Like to Think She's Happy" (2025) really prepared me for this experience more than I could have ever imagined. I felt more prepared than some of my classmates since I am just so fresh off of that experience. Unlike "I Like to Think She's Happy", we only had 10 hours to shoot our project instead of 3 days. I knew what the next steps were, I knew who I had to meet with, I knew what had to get done. Since we got assigned some head of department roles, we knew that their professors would hold them accountable if they didn't do any of their work. Some roles, I was able to hire on my own. I realized through this process that trust is everything with your crew. I am so glad that the people I got assigned were people that cared and also being able to carry that established trust with other heads of departments that I've worked with before. I felt so happy that I was able to spend so much of my energy on the creative parts of the story since I had a producer, Harry, to take care of all the logistical parts. My department heads put in so much passion into every step of their work, even on the day of, they were worrying about the slightest detail because they cared so deeply.
Honestly, it felt like the shoot was a whirlwind. What film set isn't chaotic, let's be honest with ourselves. 10 hours isn't enough to shoot a short film, I will never do that again!! We had so many shots to get done in a short time but we somehow pulled it off. When I woke up the next day, it genuinely felt like the morning after slava, I was so tired. I felt like I threw my own slava and invited some of my classmates and collaborators. I was so thankful that my actors had a lot of energy (too much energy) and that they were flexible. It was the first time for all of them acting on camera and I couldn't be more thankful for them. Finding real Serbian actors on it's own was very difficult (thank you Serbian Theater Chicago!!!!!) and the actors I had were just so fun to work with. The process of debriefing for this project just took days. So much had happened in so little time. Words on a page were footage on my computer within 10 hours. I spent the entire U-Haul drive to where we were parking it that night talking to Amir (Boom Operator/Neighbor) about how the day went. If anything, I realized this experience was very vulnerable. I opened up my culture for the first time to a bunch of people I had known for a while. For everyone, this was their first time experiencing what a slava looks like. I felt like I had a lot of explaining to do to my crew because there were things they didn't understand, but they were all super accepting of everything. Post production luckily went so smoothly because of how incredible the footage turned out. I wish I had more time to sit with the experience and the footage, but I had to turn a cut in for school.
What I learned
DO NOT SHOOT A FILM IN 10 HOURS!!!! I know this was a requirement for school, but this script could have really used two days of filming. Everything felt so rushed. "I Like to Think She's Happy" (2025) was so much more chill because we had the time. Looking back right now as I write this, we had a company move on the second day and it felt chill the entire time. This film on the other hand, we always felt like we were rushing for something. We could have used some more time on certain shots but the footage we got was still beautiful.
If you're reading this after my "I Like to Think She's Happy" page, I finally learned how to work with a producer. Harry was THE BEST producer I could have asked for. He was always there for support, he understood my overthinking, he made this film happen. Thanks to Harry, I was able to focus myself so much more creatively. I feel like I gave every department the attention they needed, including the actors. I was constantly thinking about how to better improve the story instead of logistics. Also, my department heads went above and beyond in creating a space that feels so naturally authentic.
I also learned something about myself as an editor, in which I do not like to be rushed. I like sitting with the experience and playing with the footage whenever I can. I didn't like having to constantly worry about a cut for class being done at a certain time. I like having my time with experiment and take a night to sleep on creative decisions.
Fun Facts
-"Shrekalicious memes" is a reference to Natalija's first independent short film, "I Like to Think She's Happy" (2025)
-The couple in the film is actually a married couple and this film was shot in their apartment
-This film is based off of Natalija's immediate family
-Luka (Djordje) was on the same flight in June 2024 with Natalija's brother, Mihajlo (the person his character was based off of)
-Natalija had to drive the U-Haul of equipment for most of her D2 weekend (including this shoot)
-Natalija's slava is Djurdjevdan (St. George) on May 6th
-Natalija's slava is the #1 rated slava in San Diego (according to her Serbian friends)
Credits
Written and Directed by - Natalija Plavšić
Produced by - Harry Danz IV, Natalija Plavšić
Director of Photography - Diego Tellez
Production Designers - Isabella Anguiano, Jeanette Atkins
Edited by - Natalija Plavšić
Casting Directors - Ava Rudorf, Natalija Plavšić
1st Assistant Director - Ymari Bañuelos
2nd Assistant Director - Sarah Hobson
Script Supervisor - James Marino
Production Assistant - Ava Rudorf
1st Assistant Camera - Tucker Giambrone
2nd Assistant Camera - Karman Kapsa
Camera Operator - Callie Kubal
BTS Photographer - Isaac Morales
Colorist - Bryce Jeong
Gaffer - Bryce Jeong
Key Grip - Heather van Well
Grip - Liza Peña
Sound Mixer - Dylan Kaufmann
Boom Operator - Amir Edwards
Featuring
Zorana Vukčević as Jovana
Milan Milošić as Stefan
Tatjana Utvić as Jasmina
Luka Čejović as Djordje
Dylan Kaufmann as Salesman
Amir Edwards as Neighbor
Featured Extras
Ava Rudorf
Isaac Morales
Isabella Anguiano