Good films acording to bulgarian filmmakers

Three novels deal with the mentality of the children, their agitations, and the merry and sad things in their everyday life. The movie is created with a lot of humor, cheerfulness, and great love for the kids.

After witnessing his wife's rape and murder during Ottoman rule, a traumatized Bulgarian knight, Kara Ivan, retreats to the mountains where he raises his young daughter alone among the goats.

This film is a dramatic, colorful parable about migration from the countryside to the urban areas, revealing the deep-rooted attachment of the peasant Ivan Efreytorov to the patriarchal way of life. The newly built dam has submerged his village and his fellow villagers move in prefabricated blocks of flats in the neighboring town. Left alone with his father and his son, Efreytorov is resisting fiercely the imminent change and does not want to leave his native house. Though the native village has disappeared under the water of lake, it still exists in his memories. In his mind's eye he sees the mythological scenes which combine in almost surrealist fashion with his visions of the contemporary world, memories of his dead wife and images of nature in which animals - the dog, the cow, the horse - figure very prominently. After the death of his father and the escape of his son to the town, Efreytorov sees that all his ties with the past are broken. The implacable march of time compels the man of tradition to beat a heartbreaking retreat.

In this picture, the barrier epitomizes the line between reality and dreams, the pattern of harmony and happiness. The delicate, pretty, sensitive Dorotea and the sedate middle-aged composer Antoni meet by chance. He gives her shelter in his house. Famous composer falls under the spell of young Dorothea: A pretty, thin-skinned, though quite an eccentric girl. Antoni becomes the witness of a series of strange and wonderful events. She is maintaining she is able to fly, drawing him into her half real world, when miracles are worked. It turns out that Dorotea has the supernatural gift of divining and forecasting people thoughts and intentions. Gradually Antoni overcomes his initial confusion and becomes used to the parapsychological states of the girl. He penetrates her acutely sensitive inner world where the supernatural becomes natural and the impossible possible. And when he learns that Dorotea can fly, he joins her and flies with her. During this experiment he feels a surge of creativity and happiness for the first time in many years. Is all this real or imaginary? Embarrassed, as he is, he leaves on a short trip, and when finally resolved to come back to her, it is too late. Why is it that Dorotea is found dead apparently having fallen after one of her flights?

This is an epic screen presentation showing the creation, the consolidation and the power of First Bulgarian Kingdom and the first Bulgarian ruler Khan Asparuh.

This is a philosophical, eccentric and fantastic comedy. This is a fantastic escape from the reality and a dream-rebellion of the fantasy.

In the 17th century, a Bulgarian Christian region is selected by the Ottoman rulers to serve as an example of conversion to Islam. A Janissary who was kidnapped from the village as a boy is sent to force the reluctant inhabitants to convert. The Turkish governor seeks a peaceful solution, but ultimately torture, violence, and rebellion break out.

Margarit and Margarita are high school senior students. They are madly in love. And so proud and independent that they are often in trouble with their parents and teachers. They quit school to live life their own way, only to face a world or corruption and brutality. Margarit would make no compromise and would not get involved in a game with shady rules. Margarita is more willing to do so in the name of their future together. A big manager takes her under his wing and shows himself to be a corrupt womanizer. Margarit cannot stand the debauchery of their 'protector' and kills him. After his sentence he puts an end to his life and unable to live her life this way, so does Margarita.

A 16-old girl runs away from a dangerous man and gets into a faraway village near the border. Soon she finds out the only inhabitants there - nine old men and women - make their living by growing marijuana and the village is actually an illegal plantation belonging to the man she runs away from. However, she decides to stay there and nothing remains the same. A girl is afraid of her past, both disgusting and attracting her. She is afraid of her present, both suffocating her and giving her wings. And she is afraid of the future as it projects both her nightmares and her dreams. This film is about the only 'bullet against fear' - love.

A thirteen year old kid, "the boy", lives and works in a cemetery. The cemetery is his whole life, and growing up with the dead instills in him an obsession and respect for death. His friends depend on him: An unhappy old man, a former political prisoner yearning for death, and makeup artist for deceased, a former artist who dreams of painting a masterpiece. The boy does what he can to help them. The old man attempts suicide, but upon learning the date of his death and seeing his beautiful plot chosen for him by the boy, he is able to bear his life. Upon meeting the beautiful Maria, "the boy" gives the former artist a surprise date with her. But when Maria and the artist become closer, the boy realizes that she is the daughter of the old man. The kid thinks the old man would die unhappy if he knew of her existence and so decides to hide the truth.

Moth is freed on parole after spending time in prison on wrongful conviction of murder. Jailed shortly before the Bulgarian communist coup of 1944, he now finds himself in a new and alien world - the totalitarian Sofia of the 60s. His first night of freedom draws the map of a diabolical city full of decaying neighborhoods, gloomy streets and a bizarre parade of characters.

Through Georgi (a juvenile) and Itso (an adult), we take a quick glance (about one and a half hour quick) at what happens in post cold-war Bulgaria.

This is a story of a family and two intruders.

Two troubled teens hitchhike across Bulgaria.

A Greek man, past his fifties, is driving an old-fashioned car across the border to Bulgaria to buy a child.

The events of the film are related to the Civil War in Spain. This is a film about the beauty of love - exotic and tragic and the maze of human feelings.

In September 1923 a "red" uprising in Bulgaria is crushed and drowned in blood. A year and a half later a bomb planted by left-wing terrorists explodes in the St Nedelya Church in Sofia where the cream of society has gathered. One hundred and fifty people are killed and three hundred sustain serious injuries. The Tsar and some government ministries escape because their arrival in church is delayed. In an atmosphere of unbridled "white" terror a large number of left thinking people get blacklisted by the police. The failure of the attempt on the life of Tsar provides a pretext for further atrocities. The passing of the iniquitous State Defense Act is a prelude to latter-day St Bartholomew's Day Massacre, unprecedented in twentieth-century Europe. The extremely complex political situation caused certain ultra-left forces to resort to individual terrorism. While examining the reasons for this erroneous decision, the filmmakers denounce the social system and policies, which led to terror. The facts forming the basis of the story afford a number of parallels with certain contemporary events in the world.

The story begins with a serious disillusionment experienced by a young girl at her school-leaving farewell ball. Apostol, an architect on this side of forty, meets by chance Bella at a swimming pool on the night of her graduation party. The generation gap is a wide one, but Bella falls sway to his intelligence, friends, his life-style and the respect everybody shows for her. Boyan is an actor and comic impersonator. The complex relationships among the three characters hover between friendship and love and involve certain professional motifs. The architect, an even-tempered man, is dispirited because the bold design decisions he has been taking have been regularly rejected. The overly playful actor surrounded by dummies and stage-pros, builds his life exclusively on outer effects. But deep inside he is sad because he knows that he has no real talent. Bella, unexpectedly mature for her age, cannot remain indifferent to the falsehoods and the indifferent attitude to life. She is in conflict with her own mother - a shallow television journalist. Bella's unconscious protest finds its real bearings only when she gets a glimpse of anti-fascist past of the architect who is already infatuated with her. At the end, she marries his best friend, Boyan, though Apostol would be the most important person in her lifetime. The film is notable for the vivid symbolism of its imagery. The swimming pool is not only the place of the action but also a metaphor of human life.

This film continues the tendency to produce paradoxical comedies of anti-fascism which started with Gueorgui Stoyanov's early work in late sixties. In the last days of World War II the provincial teacher Panteley arrives in Sofia to visit a cousin. Accidentally he becomes involved in the conflicts of the times. Out of pure humanity Panteley takes a wounded person to the nearest hospital where he leaves his passport as well. The wounded person proves to be a resistance fighter. Left without identity papers Panteley goes underground. This is the beginning of his "amateur" resistance in a string of comic situations. They reveal the absurdity of the clash between sound reason and the fascist police system. In his search for a way out, and constantly threatened with arrest, Panteley performs a series of courageous acts without being aware of it. He thus lives to see Victory Day but his lack of identity papers faces him once again with the risk of being suspected.

Bulgarian generals defend the dignity and independence of Bulgaria, helping the USSR in the war against fascism.

The intricate relations between an Artist, an Actress and a Poet are seen against the background of one of the most dramatic events in the recent history of Bulgaria: uprising, which broke out in 1923. Plainclothesmen murder the Poet because his verses are marked by individualist rebellion. The Artist loses his best friend and at this point of realistic first half of the film comes to the end. The second half develops on a metaphorical and fantastic level. After his meeting with the peasant Danil who has gone crazy, the Artist's illusion that art can be separate from life crumbles. He sees the rapid crushing of uprising and the suffering of the people with fearsome force and clarity. The Artist comes to understand that the reality can be a much richer source of creative inspiration than the artificially closed world of the elitist intelligentsia of his time. The film, notable for the unusual atmosphere of Konstantin Pavlov's magical lyricism is an attempt on the part of director Lyudmil Staykov at 'reconciling' two heterogeneous cinematic styles by means of montage.

Early 20th c. This is an era of seething passions, aspirations for freedom and national self-identification. Uprising are incited, blood is shed. The picture features national leaders who become heroes as early as in their lifetime. The protagonist is rank-and-file Macedonian who is unwittingly swept by the events. Later, it was his conscious choice. He was a witness of changes, crucial for the nation. He comes across legendary personalities. He gets enchanted and disappointed. He is seeking for the right answers, rethinks what he saw and experienced to tell his story in his simple, but candid and wise words of his own.

This is a sensitive film about human solidarity filled with humor and poetry.

The action takes part from August 26 to September 9,1944 - the last days of the fascist regime in Bulgaria. At that time, following a decision made by the Central Committee of the Bulgarian Communist Party, all-out preparations for an uprising are under way. The central characters are real historical figures representing two antagonistic camps. The film chronicles a series of dramatic events: secret underground meetings, actions of the combat groups and the partisans, strikes and mass rallies, the last attempts of the regime to hold on to power. The film recreates the atmosphere on the eve of the uprising, which culminated in the main thrust: the seizure of the Defense Ministry in Sofia on the night before September 9.

A social and psychological study of contemporary problems.