Johnny Depp's Weird Obsession With Serbia

I'm right now on the verge of a new life, and I like it. I like a re-beginning. And I would love for that to start here in Serbia, if you'll have me. What is Captain Jack Sparrow doing accepting an award in Serbia? From the President. And confessing his love for the country and its people. He's even building a house next to the most popular Serbian ever, but more on that later. I was blessed a long time ago when I met a very strange man. I instantly looked at him and went, he doesn't belong in Hollywood. His name was Emir Kusturica. And Emir Kusturica became a brother. His family became my family. I watched his children grow up. And it's been this same exact bond that we've had since the very first day. And that says a lot about a person, especially someone like Emir. Johnny Depp's love for Serbia can be credited to one person, Emir Kusturica. Emir is one of Europe's most successful filmmakers. In 1993, he wrote and directed a movie called Arizona Dream, which starred Johnny Depp. It's a very odd movie, one that didn't have mass appeal, but it's most certainly a well-crafted piece of art, with many layers of meaning and incredible cinematography. Kusturica is known for his unconventional and deeply personal style of filmmaking. Both of these men have an artistic personality, which means they value creating great art above anything else. They also share a love for music. I bet you didn't have Johnny Depp playing guitar with a Yugoslavian rock band in Serbia, saying pichkin din on your bingo card. But don't worry, this video gets crazier. Anyways, Emir is not a Hollywood person. Maybe Johnny resonated with that. At that point, he was 10 years into his career and already understood the Hollywood machine. But his relationship with the Serbian director didn't start out great. The first time we met, it was at the, I think it was the Beverly Wilshire Hotel. And he was like this. And I was like, you know, you know, a little distant because he wasn't speaking. And it was kind of, I thought he was rude. So, you know, I can remember leaving the meeting. I called my agent at the time. I said, hey, f**k this guy. F**k him, I ain't doing that. I'm not interested, you know. It was kind of mutual, I think. And then maybe three weeks or a month later, we met again at a diner, a small diner. And it took like that. It was fine, yeah. It was perfect. Oh, no, the first time I hated him. I hated him and he hated me. And he said to me, the first meeting, he said, I've seen this movie. Edward Scissorhands. I said, yeah. He said, yes. I said, and? What do you think? And he said, it's scary. Emir never made another big Hollywood movie after Arizona Dream. Emir's movies were very artistic, and his eccentric storytelling style didn't make him an extremely marketable director to big studio executives looking for massive returns. Everybody in Hollywood and the movie industry is always concerned about how much money a movie is going to make. You know, in the box office and how many theaters it's in and how popular it becomes. It's refreshing to know now what I knew then, which really is that who cares about the numbers? When you're able to first experience something like this and live through something like this and be involved with something as magical as this, I mean, it's okay. You forget about how much a movie made in the box office. Going back to this weird ceremony in Serbia. What the hell is this? Well, this isn't really a unique ritual. Celebrities sometimes receive nonsense medals from leaders of nations, especially in Eastern European countries. We just love good publicity, especially from Western sources. One of the most commonly known examples is Steven Seagal's weird relationship with Putin. He has received Russian citizenship and honors from the president. His public support of certain Russian policies has strained his reputation, in the West at least, especially among those critical of Russia. And despite this, Seagal continues to maintain a high profile in Russia, often emphasizing his admiration for its culture and leadership. Why do you support Vladimir Putin, Mr. Seagal? I can't answer questions that stupid. Funny enough, Emir got something similar from Putin. But more impressively, he was able to talk to Putin in decent Russian, a language similar to Serbian in many ways. By the way, Vuchi, as Depp would call you, I'm ready to accept my medal for all the fantastic memes I've been making about Serbia for over a year now. Thanks. Johnny Depp, believe it or not, does also, like myself, have a Serbian citizenship, and actually seems to know a decent amount of Serbian. There's many clips of him online speaking a bit of Serbian and understanding many cultural norms and references. I do have a fierce passion for pretty much everything here. Čevapčići, of course, you know. Somebody told me something about Slivovice, but I've never had that before. Not really. Maybe once. And something that we wanted to say in the palace? Yeah, the kind of philosophy? Yeah. Yeah, I think this is maybe what I said. Johnny Depp's Serbian is pretty good. He knows a couple sentences, but he knows them really well, probably because he's said them a thousand times. Now, let's look at someone that has really poor Serbian. It's truly remarkable. There's only five words in this whole thing, and he got the emphasis on every single word wrong. It's almost like he tried to learn those words like five minutes before this started filming. So, really bad Serbian from John Travolta. Kusturica and his family definitely played the biggest role in Johnny's love for Serbia and its people. Here's what Kusturica said about Mr. Depp. Unfortunately, Emir and Johnny never made another major film together after Arizona Dream, although sometimes Johnny does appear in documentaries to talk about the director. In 2019, there were many rumors about a project called Pancho Villa, which was supposed to be a biopic about the famous Mexican revolutionary, which was to be made by Emir and star Johnny Depp and Selma Hayek. Many articles at the time even said that the pair are learning Spanish to be able to create a movie like this. Unfortunately, the project ran into some issues and was never made. Going back to the strange ceremony, I think it's also important to note the date. It happened February 2022, a couple of months before the most taxing fiasco in Johnny's life, the Amber Heard trials. Yes, how did they know? Now, with all of this in mind, the dream to escape Hollywood, escape the press, and deal with more genuine people, you can see why the appeal of moving to Serbia becomes very clear. As mentioned earlier in the video, it seems that Johnny Depp is currently building a house that will be next door to Novak Djokovic. Although all of this could just be a rumor, Serbia is hopeful that Johnny will find solace here and potentially deliver on promises to work with artists and bring his talents to our film industry. Because they must fall in line with the person in front of them. You want to live that kind of life. I wish you the best. I'll be on the other side somewhere.