Küstendorf

Listen first to the wood. Boards creak under your shoes, and a door swings somewhere on an iron hinge. The air up here smells of pine resin and woodsmoke, cooler than the valley below. Around you, log houses lean together along a small slope, their roofs steep and dark. You are standing on Mećavnik hill, above the village of Mokra Gora, in the mountains of western Serbia. This is Küstendorf, and almost nothing here is as old as it looks.

The village is the creation of Emir Kusturica, the film director from Sarajevo. He won the top prize at Cannes twice, for films such as Underground. In the early 2000s he came to this valley to shoot a film called Life Is a Miracle. He needed a location, and he decided to build one. When the cameras stopped, the village stayed. Today it works as a small hotel, a cultural centre, and his own mountain home.

The name holds a small joke. Kusturica took the first part of his own surname and joined it to the German word Dorf, which means village. So Küstendorf is, quite literally, Kusturica's village. Serbians often use a second name too. They call it Drvengrad, which simply means wooden town. Both names fit. One carries the personality of its founder. The other describes exactly what you see around you.

Look closely at the houses. Many are traditional log cabins from this part of Serbia, built from heavy timber with joints cut at the corners. Some of these structures were brought here from villages in the surrounding region and rebuilt on the hill. Others were made new in the old style. The result is a place that feels assembled with care, like a set designer's idea of a mountain village. That is not an accident. It was designed by a filmmaker, with a filmmaker's eye.

Here is the first surprise. This film set won a serious architecture award. In 2005, Küstendorf received the Philippe Rotthier European Prize for Architecture, a prize that honours buildings made in harmony with local tradition. Architects took notice of the way the village uses wood, stone and the shape of the hill. Few people expect a movie location to earn that kind of respect. Yet here it is, recognised as architecture in its own right.

Now look at the street signs. The lanes of this tiny village carry the names of people Kusturica admires. You may find streets named for the inventor Nikola Tesla and for the writer Ivo Andrić, who won the Nobel Prize for Literature. Other names come from far outside Serbia, such as the revolutionary Che Guevara, the footballer Diego Maradona, and film directors like Federico Fellini. Reading the signs is a little like reading the founder's personal hall of heroes.

At the heart of the village stands a small wooden church dedicated to Saint Sava. Saint Sava was a medieval prince who became the first archbishop of the Serbian Orthodox Church. He is one of the most loved figures in Serbian history. The church follows the simple shape of rural wooden churches in this region. Notice the shingled roof and the careful handwork in the timber. Even in a village built for film, faith has a central place.

Cinema, of course, is never far away. Below ground, the village has its own small cinema, named after the director Stanley Kubrick. Every January since 2008, Küstendorf hosts an international film and music festival. Unlike large festivals, it focuses on young filmmakers and student work. Well-known directors and actors have come here to talk with them in a relaxed mountain setting. Johnny Depp was among the guests in its early years.

Here is the second surprise. At the very first festival, Kusturica held a mock funeral. He buried a copy of an American action film, Die Hard 4, as a symbolic protest against big commercial cinema. The gesture was half joke and half statement. It said a lot about the festival's spirit. Here the focus would be on personal, independent filmmaking, not on blockbusters. Visitors still enjoy looking for traces of that playful rebellion around the village.

Now turn your attention outward, to the landscape. The village sits in the Mokra Gora area, between the mountains of Zlatibor and Tara. These are green, rolling hills with dark forests and open meadows. In summer, the slopes fill with wildflowers and the sound of insects. In winter, snow covers the roofs and the paths turn white and quiet. From the edges of the village, you can follow the folds of the valley far into the distance.

Down in that valley runs another local treasure, the Šargan Eight railway. It is a narrow-gauge heritage line that climbs through the mountains. Seen from above, its route forms a loop shaped roughly like the number eight. That is how it got its name. The line was restored as a tourist railway, and Kusturica also used it in his filming here. Many visitors combine a ride on the old train with a walk through the wooden village.

As you wander, notice the small touches. There are carved wooden details, old tools and objects placed along walls and porches, and benches where you can sit and watch the light move across the hills. Restaurants serve hearty local food, the kind made for cold mountain evenings. Some visitors stay overnight in the cabins. In the early morning or late evening, when the day visitors have gone, the village becomes very quiet.

Before you leave, stand still for a moment. Feel the uneven boards under your feet. Smell the pine and the smoke from a chimney. Look at the steep roofs against the sky, and then at the long green valley beyond them. This village began as a dream for a film. It became a real place, with a church, a cinema, and streets full of heroes. As you walk away, listen once more for the creak of wood behind you.