The Unknown Soldier’s Patent Leather Shoes (1979)

Original title: Лачените обувки на незнайния воин
Year: 1979
Runtime: 1 hour, 20 minutes
Country: Bulgaria
Language: Bulgarian
Subtitles: English(.srt)
Genre: Drama | Magical Realism

Director: Rangel Vulchanov

Cast:
Slavka Ankova
Emiliya Myrynska
Ivan Stoychev
Borislav Tsankov
Nikolay Velichkov
Rangel Vulchanov himself

Plot/Synopsis:

A middle-aged Bulgarian is watching the change of the guard in front of the Buckingham Palace. For no apparent reason, while looking, in his mind he gets back to his childhood in the little Bulgarian village, he grew up in. Different rites, different traditions and still he finds something in common. He recalls the people he knew, he feared or admired. He ponders over that life of no brilliance, where people plough, harvest, marry and die, celebrate or grieve. Miracle are also worked, conceived in a unlimited child’s imagination. It is the child’s perception of the world that helps us to give a meaning to the major questions of human existence.

This is a deeply personal film in which the director goes back to his own childhood in order to show us a bizarre world made up of real-life images and the fantasies of a child. Though essentially introspective, the film is much more of a philosophical speculation, in terms of various images and apparitions, about the spiritual traditions of the Bulgarian people and the peculiarities of a national character shaped by specific historical events. The central scene shows a multitudinous village wedding. A ‘White Aunt’ is being married to a ‘Black Uncle’. To the mind of the child these are two polar images, which evolve into summary symbols of the Beautiful and the Ugly, the sublime and the deformed, the refined and the primitive in the spiritual heritage of the nation. Besides the wedding we are presented with a kaleidoscopic picture of a harvest and war, floods and hot summer days, childbirth, the death of centenarians and the life after death. This is a philosophical parable rendered in almost purely documentary terms: the cast includes no professional actors.

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Lachenite Obuvki Na Neznayniya Voin (The Unkown Soldier’s Patent Leather Shoes) 1979
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A Nameless Band (1982)

Original title: Orkestar Bez Ime
Year: 1982
Runtime: 1 hour, 51 minutes
Country: Bulgaria
Language: Bulgarian
Subtitles: English (.srt)
Genre: Comedy | Drama

Director: Lyudmil Kirkov

Cast:
Velko Kynev … Velko
Filip Trifonov … Filip
Pavel Popandov … Pavel
Georgi Mamalev … Gosho
Katerina Evro … Reni
Maria Kavardjikova … Vanya
Dimitar Manchev … Mitashki
Nikolay Nikolaev … Italianetzat
Zhivka Peneva … Pepi
Zinka Drumeva … Telefonistkata
Georgi Rusev … Bay Petar
Ivan Tzvetarski … Peshev
Anton Radichev … Mazhat na Pepi
Ivan Yanchev … Fotografat
Stoyan Stoychev … Shefat na serviza

Plot/Synopsis:

A group of four musicians and their female lead singer are anxious to get a job in the resort area of the Black Sea for the crowded summer months, so they jump at the chance to play at the Golden Sands hotel when a local entrepreneur says he has it set up for them. But they can only go on the condition that the lead singer is replaced with the entrepreneur’s girlfriend – not exactly a vocal rival by any means. Desperate for this opportunity, the four say yes and take off, only to find that their engagement is in a local bar and not the promised hotel. Meanwhile, they have problems of their own as one of them is after the new singer but gets nowhere, and the boyfriend of the preceding singer is depressed that she’s not there. To make things decidedly worse, the new lead singer has a limited repertoire, to say the least, and in the end, opts for taking off with an Italian tourist who has promised her a better gig elsewhere. This does nothing for the job prospects of the band, but a lot for their experience in the ways of the fickle world.

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Orkestar Bez Ime ( A Nameless Band ) 1982
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Vchera (Yesterday) 1988

Original title: Vchera
Year: 1988
Runtime: 1 hour, 18 minutes
Country: Bulgaria
Language: Bulgarian
Subtitles: English (.srt)
Genre: Drama

Director: Ivan Andonov

Cast:
Hristo Shopov … Ivan
Georgi Staykov … Rostislav
Sofiya Kuzeva … Dana
Svetla Todorova … Marina
Georgi Rusev … Direktorat Tzonchev
Nikola Rudarov … Matematikat Barumov
Stoyan Aleksiev … Naydenov
Krasimir Rankov … Inspektorat
Pavel Popandov … Uchitelyat po fizkultura
Maria Stefanova … Uchitelkata
Petar Popyordanov … Kostov
Christine Bartlet … Uchitelkata po angliyski

Plot/Synopsis:

The late 1960s was the time of Beatles and Rolling Stones, the time of sexual revolution. These events have their echo in Bulgarian English-learning school. The school order provokes a protest of the students due to the narrow-minded teachers. Back into 60s. While out there, in the West, they are listening to The Beatles and The Rolling Stones, the hippie movement is at its height, pupils in Bulgaria are obliged to be shingled, to wear full-dress uniforms and sing military songs. But for how long? A group of pupils from a language school believe they have to live differently. They are seeking for ways to shake off everything phony, to be candid with each other, to be part of a wider, much more motley and interesting world. Some of them pay a high price, other experience cruel worldly lessons, but they at least made their best to save face.

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Vchera (Yesterday) 1988
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