20/09/2023 - Twelve features will be competing for the festival’s top award from 20-28 September, while 25 shorts are also going head to head

Every autumn, virtually the entire Bulgarian film industry flocks to the seaside city of Varna for the Golden Rose Film Festival. At its 41st edition (20-28 September), the gathering is showcasing the newest Bulgarian features and minority co-productions, some of them meeting the audience for the very first time. The event opens tonight with Tonislav Hristov’s documentary The Last Seagull [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Tonislav Hristov
film profile] (Finland/Norway/Bulgaria).

The director of the Bulgarian National Film Center, Peter D Todorov, tells Cineuropa that the festival’s main attraction is the “strong competition between young talent and prominent Bulgarian auteurs, and may the best one win the Golden Rose”. One particular highlight of the festival is its short-film competition (the jury of which sees the involvement of Cineuropa’s very own Mariana Hristova), and this year, as many as 25 shorts will have the rather rare opportunity to be shown on the big screen.

The 12 features competing for the Golden Rose are Sissy Denkova’s Scent of Linden (USA/Bulgaria); Avelina Prat’s Vasil [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Avelina Prat
film profile] (Spain/Bulgaria); Theodore Ushev’s Phi 1.618 [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] (Bulgaria/Canada); Georgi Kostov’s The Pulse of the Dance (Bulgaria); Ivan Vladimirov’s Plague (Bulgaria); Stephan Komandarev’s Blaga’s Lessons [+see also:
film review
interview: Stephan Komandarev
film profile] (Bulgaria/Germany), which is also the Bulgarian candidate for next year’s Academy Awards (see the news); Peter Rusev’s Apostol: A Gentle Knight in Brutalia (Bulgaria); Georgi Dyulgerov’s Memoir of a Betrayal (Bulgaria); Yana Titova’s Dyad [+see also:
film review
interview: Yana Titova
film profile] (Bulgaria); Tonislav Hristov’s The Good Driver [+see also:
film review
film profile] (Finland/Bulgaria/Sweden); Boby Zahariev’s Game of Trust (Bulgaria); and Marian Valev’s Chalga (Bulgaria).

Several TV-show pilots will be screened at the festival: War of the Letters, which tells a story set in 10th-century Bulgaria; the family drama The Grapes of Guilt; and the thrillers The Hunt for Salamander and Autumn of the Demon. Several Bulgarian classics will also be featured – for example, Atanas Traykov's Thorn Apple, which stars actress Meglena Karalambova, gracing this edition’s poster.