Ivan Nichev's Book of Survival

A top Bulgarian director says his films show his country as 'one very small but exceptionally humane nation. ... We all live peacefully together side by side. I'm sure that sooner or later the world will notice this.' by Polia Alexandrova 21 January 2004 Ivan Nichev has been one of Bulgaria’s most popular film directors for over two decades. He emerged from the transitions of the late 1980s and early 1990s as one of the few directors still working successfully within the country. Although today the state gives precious little backing to the film industry, and just one or two domestic feature films reach the few remaining cinemas each year, Nichev has found ways to attract donors and win public interest.

His portfolio includes such films as Stars in Her Hair, Tears in Her Eyes (1977), Boomerang (1978), and Ivan and Alexandra (1988). His two latest pictures, After the End of the World (1999) and Journey to Jerusalem (2003), explore relations between Bulgarians of different ethnic origin, and address the theme of tolerance as a part of Bulgarian national identity. After the End of the World is a romantic tale that offers a glimpse into the richly textured ethnic heritage of Bulgaria, while Journey to Jerusalem will compete at this year's Oscar awards as Bulgaria's first-ever entry for best foreign film.

Ivan Nichev was born in 1940. He studied film art in Poland under the legendary director Andrzej Wajda. In 1997 he became a member of the European Film Academy. He lives in Sofia, where he teaches at the National Academy for Theater and Film Art. TOL found him at his home and office in the center of Sofia. These days the director is keen on the idea of establishing a special program for film managers, with the aim of promoting Bulgarian films on the international market.


TOL: In your two latest films you explore themes connected with the Jews of Bulgaria. There are good reasons to do this--because Bulgarians saved the country's entire Jewish community from deportation and murder. Yet you are not from a Jewish background yourself. Why is this subject so interesting to you?

Ivan Nichev: After the End of the World tells the story of a Bulgarian Jew who returns to Bulgaria after spending his whole life in Israel. He left the country as a kid with his family, but after the fall of communism he travels back home to visit his old house and meet his old love. And he remembers the dramatic events of the past. In making this movie I slowly became familiar with the subject, and while presenting it at festivals all around the world people in the audience would always ask questions about how Jews were living in Bulgaria during World War II. Most of them had no information at all. Some of course knew part of the story of how Bulgaria saved its own Jews from the death camps. But it was clear to me that this particular period of Bulgarian history was sinking into complete oblivion not only for the international public, but for the Bulgarians as well. And there was a huge need for someone to start speaking about this, loudly.

If there is something in Bulgarian history local people should be particularly proud of, it is definitely the moment when Bulgarian Jews were saved from Nazi aggression. We owe this moment of pride not only to the king, or to the vice-chairman of the Bulgarian parliament at that time, Dimitar Peshev, who helped stop the deportation of the Jews, not even only to the Bulgarian Orthodox Church, which defended the Jewish community even though it followed another religion, but we owe this most of all to the ordinary Bulgarian people and their tolerance towards their fellow citizens. So that is how my Journey to Jerusalem was actually born.

TOL: How did you become familiar with the events of the time?

IN: I started doing research, reading books and documents, meeting people from the Jewish community in Bulgaria and descendants of Bulgarian Jews in Israel, shooting interviews with those who remember important things from that time, recording their memories. And then, as it happens in the filmmaking process, I started working on the screenplay together with the young Bulgarian screenwriter Yuri Dachev. The interest in it is bigger now, especially after it was nominated as the Bulgarian representative for an Oscar. I'm happy that together with my creative team, I have succeeded to produce a movie that represents the Bulgarian people as one very small but exceptionally humane nation.

TOL: Why did you feel the need to speak about Bulgarian tolerance?

IN: I have participated in many international festivals through the years. I'm always asked the same questions: 'Did your secret service really kill [the exiled dissident] Georgi Markov with a poisoned umbrella in 1978?' or 'Were you really involved in the attempt to assassinate Pope John Paul II?' Always questions showing only the negative side of our national character. Our reputation abroad has always been kind of incomplete and--in some ways--very negative. That is why, especially now, when everyone is talking about how Bulgaria will become a member of the European Union in 2007, there is a huge need for people around Europe to hear the truth about Bulgaria and get to know this country better. I decided to do something to speed up this process, since a film is a product that can easily enter anyone's home.

TOL: In Journey to Jerusalem three Bulgarians, itinerant actors, help two German Jewish kids reach the Black Sea coast and get on a boat to Palestine. They risk their lives and jobs to help these kids survive. This happens at a time when thousands of Jews from Europe passed through Bulgaria on their way to the land of their dreams. Can we find this kind of tolerance in Bulgaria today?

IN: Times are difficult today, the good qualities are often suppressed in favor of a kind of aggression that exists in society. But we can't judge the entire nation just because there are certain people in it who often forget what social behavior means. Bulgarians are generally nice people, goodhearted people. Look at the Balkans--if you drew a map of all the places that have been centers of ethnic hatred at one or another point in our recent history you'd notice that Bulgaria was not part of it. In this country we also have big ethnic and minority groups, Bulgarians, Armenians, Turks, Jews, Greeks, and Roma, but we all live peacefully together side by side. We should be proud of this special quality. In Bulgaria, hostility against people from other religious, cultural, or ethnic backgrounds simply doesn't exist. I'm sure that sooner or later the world will notice this and Bulgaria, considering its geopolitical position, will become an important spot on the world map. The Bulgarians themselves should start thinking in that direction and work on the relations between different ethnic groups within the country. That is a good way for this nation to develop even further: by learning from the traditions of the past. Of course this can only happen in the long run. First, we have to cure the habits this nation has inherited from the years of communism, which I realize is a very difficult and slow process. I believe that our grandchildren will be the first ones who will taste the fruits of change.

TOL: You worked in film both before and after the changes. How did you survive the transition period?

IN: I didn't feel the shock because even before the changes I was not a member of the Bulgarian Communist Party. I studied filmmaking in Poland, where I picked up a different way of seeing the world. That made me a kind of 'inner emigrant' after my return to Bulgaria. But I was lucky, because I received the support of one woman, the famous Bulgarian writer Svoboda Bachvarova, who was a member of the party, but one of those who had a different vision. She looked at the system in a kind of radical way. Maybe this was the reason she decided to help my career. I was also supported by several other writers of the regime, among them Pavel Vejinov, Bogomil Raynov, and Anjel Vagenshtain, who had a certain authority and helped me a lot. But I still had to fight for each of my movies, and that gave me the feeling that no one in this world owes me anything. I had to research the background, look for ideas, fight for resources, explore ways to realize my projects, organize the people around me, while at the same time other directors were just taking help and orders coming from above. All this prepared me for what was to come a few years later.

Before the changes we had no problems with money, we didn't even think about it. Today we have to work out the budget first and only after that start with the creative process. But my experience from the past helped me to survive the transitions and become one of the few directors in Bulgaria who are still working. I have learned how to think globally. I always consider subjects that could be interesting not only to local people but also to the international audience.

TOL: Could you give an example?

IN: I remember a festival in Switzerland; this was before the changes. Bulgaria was represented by Ivan Andonov and myself. My colleague's movie was called Roof. It showed all those funny situations people could get into while trying to buy cement in Bulgaria. About how one needs a lot of connections in order to buy something as simple as cement. Ivan was not there, so people turned to me with questions instead: 'But why don't you just go to the market and buy cement?' How could I explain that under communism people needed to know other people for all kinds of things? How could I explain that suppliers would hide their products so they could get tips and bribes for them? They just couldn't understand me. And although I tried to explain in detail, there was still someone in the audience who would stand up and say, 'But why don't you guys just go to the market and buy cement?' This is what I mean when I say that I prefer to pick up subjects that will be understood by both Bulgarians and international viewers. I like to talk about universal things, such as the relations between people, that can be understood by everyone, from Sofia and Warsaw to Sydney and New York.

TOL: It is very difficult to work in film in Bulgaria today, especially as the state provides only 700,000 euros for film production. That is enough for approximately one picture a year. How do you survive in such conditions?

IN: My colleagues and I always talk about how to attract foreign sponsors to our projects, because this is an important issue if we want to show our products outside Bulgaria. For instance, After the End of the World was a co-production between Bulgaria, Greece, and Germany and was guaranteed distribution in all those countries. Journey to Jerusalem was supported by [the Council of Europe's] Eurimages fund, which helped its distribution in Europe. Collaboration with our foreign partners is extremely important for me, because Bulgaria is a very small country, we speak a language that few people understand, and unfortunately we have never had a well-developed market for our movies. Besides, the competition coming from Western Europe and the United States has always been very strong. And while a movie produced and distributed in Germany can easily get its producers' money back, in Bulgaria the economic crisis doesn't allow us to act independently.

TOL: How might the Bulgarian movie industry integrate into the European distribution market?

IN: I try to make my students see that it is very important to learn how to play according to the rules of the game. Unfortunately, the game I'm talking about is very different in Europe than in the United States. Here, most movies are still made with the help of different funds and organizations, while in America the whole process is purely commercial. That's why at the National Academy of Theater and Film Art in Sofia we have this idea to start educating young people in the 'art of distribution.' These people will be graduates in economics, management, or finance. They will finally find a way for different Bulgarian film products to step into the European market. I hope we will be able to do this within the next year.

TOL: Your movies seem to be more popular abroad than in Bulgaria. Why is that?

IN: I will give you the example of one of my previous movies, Bay Ganyo. It was released in the early '90s and became one of the most watched movies of all time in Bulgaria. Nearly a million people went to see it, while at the same time American films were drawing no more than 400,000 viewers. But at that time we had about 2,000 movie theaters around the country. Today there are at best 200. Most are modern multiplexes where a ticket sells for 5 leva [$3]--quite expensive by local standards. Bulgarians simply do not go to the movies as often as they used to.

TOL: You mentioned Bay Ganyo, one of the most famous characters in Bulgarian literature. At the moment you are working on a new series based on him for Bulgarian state TV. Who is Bay Ganyo for you?

IN: The series is a sequel to the ones that were later released as a feature. The four shows will air in January 2004 and I hope they will make people laugh, because it is pure comedy. Who is Bay Ganyo? He is a sort of re-assembling character. He is like a mirror to all of us--we look at him and discover similar shapes and features. That is why he is immortal, and why he is still topical more than a hundred years after his adventures were created by the great Bulgarian writer Aleko Konstantinov. I think a nation that can laugh at its own defects and disadvantages is a living nation. And through this character we are doing exactly this. Bay Ganyo is a very clever man, very adept at manipulating different situations, who chases his own interests without regard for anyone around him or their feelings. To achieve his goals, all means are allowable, and sometimes that leads to very comical situations. Konstantinov said that if you left this character to act in an environment without strict rules a very cruel figure could emerge out of his personality, everything negative in him would come out. But if you put this man in an environment with certain rules, he will probably show some sort of initiative and help society in a positive way.

Why is my new Bay Ganyo crueler than the previous one, his father, who represented a kind of romantic era? Because the environment we live in at the moment is crueler than the one 10 years ago. I hope many people will understand the message behind my film: that we should start playing the game according to the rules if we don't want characters like Bay Ganyo to exist among us anymore.