Zvonimir Maycug

Zvonimir Majcug (born 1959), better known by his pen name Zvonimir Maycug, is a Croatian film producer, director, screenwriter, actor, and writer. He is famous for producing the first Croatian and Yugoslav pornographic film Oaza(Oasis) in 1984, which was banned. His film Kalvarija(Calvary) also received notoriety.

Biography Zvonimir Maycug was born in Zvonik in 1959. In middle school, he participated in film and photographic extracurriculars. He started recording amateur film in 1974, and began writing scripts the following year. He completed his studies at the Zagreb Hotelier School. He recorded a tourist film in Germany, and a documentary film about clay potters who make water pots, in Marija Bistrica. Then he unsuccessfully tried to enroll at the Zagreb Academy of Film Art to study film making. During his compulsory military service in the Yugoslav Army, he wrote the script for his first film, Ja sam tvoj Bog (I am Your God). Upon finishing service, he produced it in 1983, as the youngest film director in Yugoslavia. The film never entered popular distribution.

After recording the hardcore pornographic film Oaza (Oasis) in 1984, he was sentenced to two years of parole and three months of prison if he made the same offense again. The decision was made by the County court in Zagreb by the judge Ranko Marijan on 20 December 1985. His defense argued that it was incorrectly classified as pornography, because the confiscated copy was not intended for publication. He recorded a different version in 1988 which had some success on the video market.

He recorded Kalvarija (Calvary), the first Croatian gay film, in 1997. Actors in his films were amateurs and friends. He recorded his films with a low budget and took many roles in production. After recording Kalvarija, he was left bankrupt. He had to sell his own family house to cover the debts caused by producing the little distributed film. This stopped his production of the film Blago kralja Tomislava (The Treasure of King Tomislav), and a film adaptation of his novel Noć kada su umirale ruže (The Night the Roses Were Dying). He hasn't been involved in writing, publishing or film since. He used to paint while he was in high school, and started earning money off it in the 1990s. His work was primarily copies and commissions for the Catholic Church. He started painting under a pseudonym when the Church found out that he was convicted for creating pornography. During his life he also worked in journalism and erotic theater. He now works in catering and says that "film was always just a hobby for me". When asked if he will ever return to producing film, he says that maybe he will when his children grow up and he can't put anyone at risk with his financial decisions.

Filmography Ja sam tvoj Bog The film was produced in 1983. It is an erotic film with comedic elements. While in the Yugoslav military, Maycug met a man from Gornji Vakuf and visited him upon finishing service. He met an amateur actor group there, consisting of a credit approver in the Bank of Sarajevo, among others. There was enough funding, but every actor was an amateur, aside from lead actress Ružica Sokić. The film was recorded on a 35mm tape in Jadran Film. Shortly before distribution with Kinematografi, Maycug tried publishing a magazine called YU Express with the publisher Vjesnik. However, it was banned by the Zagreb court because of the article "Da li će muslimanski manijaci osvojiti svijet?"(Will the Muslim maniacs conquer the world?), which critiqued Khomeini and Gaddafi, on 31 December 1983. This was due to fear of retribution by the Iranian and Libyan embassies. Following this, Kinematografi cancelled the planned distribution. The lead actress Ružica Sokić also protested, having said that she was lured into the project through misrepresentation. Maycug says this was because of the 1992 shorter VHS re-release, where a few pornographic scenes were edited in the tape from foreign films. The film was only shown at private screenings.

A documentary about the producer was made by Gordan Stojić in 1999, titled "Maycug". Oaza received a short segment in Silvio Mirošničenko's 2011 Pod udarom cenzure(Under Censorship), a documentary about the history of censorship of Croatian film. Kalvarija was shown in cinema Europa in 2011. His entire body of extant work was shown at the accompanying program of the Dani hrvatskog filma (Days of Croatian Film) film festival in 2016. Kalvarija attained cult popularity on the Internet.