Bulgarian Film Festival

From 25 to 31 May, Rome will host a major festival devoted to the best Bulgarian cinema of recent years and to the hundred-year history of this fascinating film tradition. The Bulgarian Film Festival, organised by the Bulgarian Cultural Institute in Rome, will take place at Rome's Casa del Cinema in Villa Borghese from 25 to 31 May 2015. The initiative forms part of International Culture Month promoted by Roma Capitale. Numerous partners have supported it, beginning with the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Bulgaria, which organises the event in cooperation with the Bulgarian Embassies in Italy and to the Holy See. The festival also enjoys the patronage of Roma Capitale's Department of Culture and Tourism and the valuable cooperation of FUIS (the Italian Writers' Federation), the Bulgarian National Film Center, the Italian–Bulgarian Cultural Association “La Fenice” and the Italian Chamber of Commerce in Bulgaria. Media partners include Bulgarian National Television, involved since the first edition, and, from this year, Cinecorriere, Cineuropa, What's up and Corriere Italia-Bulgaria magazines and the online newspaper Affaritaliani.it. Expected guests include Bulgarian Culture Minister Vezhdi Rashidov; Pavel Vasev, Director of the Bulgarian National Film Center; Sevda Shishmanova, Director of Programming at Bulgarian National Television; directors Stefan Komandarev (The Judgment), Yavor Veselinov (Adultery) and Georgi Balabanov (The Petrov File); actors Asen Blatechki (The Judgment), Malin Krastev (The Petrov File), Vlado Penev (Adultery), Stefka Yanorova (Hombre), Paraskeva Dzhukelova (The Judgment, July) and Mihail Bilalov (The Petrov File); producers Galina Toneva (July) and Atanas Marinov (Hombre); and Anna Simeonoff, graphic designer and curator of the Plakat Kombinat platform for the exhibition I Love This Movie.

The Bulgarian Film Festival is, in short, a window onto the best new productions of a cinema with which Italy has built an extraordinary dialogue over many years. This year, 2015, is particularly significant: exactly one hundred years ago, the first Bulgarian film, The Bulgarian Is Gallant (Българан е галант) by Vasil Gendov, was screened. This edition of the Festival therefore includes some of the most significant titles of 2014, such as The Judgment (Съдилището), director Stefan Komandarev's latest work, starring Asen Blatechky alongside Serbia's Miki Manojlović (Underground and Black Cat, White Cat by Kusturica, or The Butcher by Grimaldi); and The Petrov File (Досието Петров): an intriguing look at friendship and betrayal during the final years of Bulgaria's communist regime, written by French screenwriter Jean-Claude Carrière (whose screenplays include Buñuel's Belle de Jour and That Obscure Object of Desire, Ferreri's La cagna and Forman's Goya's Ghosts).

As is customary, the Bulgarian Film Festival is an important opportunity for Bulgarian directors, actors and producers to meet their Italian colleagues. A large delegation of leading figures in Bulgarian cinema, headed by Bulgarian Culture Minister Vezdhi Rascidov, will attend this year’s opening in Rome. Among the Italian guests at previous editions, particular mention should be made of Ettore Scola, Maria Grazia Cucinotta, the Taviani brothers, Luigi Perelli, Sebastiano Somma and others.

(Source: Roma Today)