Slava (2016) Reviews

• Pure and excellent satire

  frantastika2017-02-24

  I saw this film at the VIFF 2016 (Vancouver International Film Festival) without knowing much about it. The film was a pleasure from beginning to end. The story is simple but the actors Margita Goshen and Stefan Denolyubov are perfect for delivering this dark and poignant film. There are many comments about our society that anyone can relate to: corruption, media, abuse of power, etc... But what really makes the film fantastic is the ending, not for everybody's taste but it is exactly that which makes it unique. I am looking forward to see more films from these filmmakers.

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• Very Dark Gallows Humor & Satire

  larrys32017-09-18

  The same filmmakers that brought to the screen the terrific 2014 Bulgarian film "The Lesson" bring us this very dark film, filled with gallows humor and satire. Once again, Margita Gosheva gives an amazing performance here, and I regard her as just an incredible actress. However, her portrayal and the unrelenting dark aspects of the movie kept me incensed throughout, as an intensely shy, stuttering, and honest railway worker (Stefan Denolyubov) is humiliated and manipulated not only by Gosheva but by the Bulgarian Transport Ministry, and an investigative journalist as well. All I guess this means is that the film was presented so well that I reacted quite viscerally to it all, as it touched more than one nerve in me. Therefore, it proved not to be my ideal idea of an evening's entertainment. I only wish the implied ending was actually shown, as I would have loved to have seen it.

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• Excellent

  mortsdominguez2017-07-26

  Astonishing low budget film. One by one, it is able to show the weakness of the different powers, from politics to press, and how greed pushes the to take shortcuts, that obviously carry victims. The plot, although original is quite simple, however it serves to its purpose, elaborate this accurate picture from Bulgarian politics, press, gangsters, middle and working class. Every of it showed through the eyes of a man, whom despite of his awful economic situation, has never lost his naive glance. Educative story from the hand of poetic pictures, in which the UE is commonly involved in a second plan.

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• First rate black comedy

  barkingechoacrosswaves2017-04-25

  This is a very skillfully made and incisive movie. Part parable, part satire, it follows the struggles of a very poor man who tries to do the right thing and then gets coldly manipulated and abused by multiple levels of a corrupt system as a "reward" for his honesty. The story is both painful and quite funny to watch as railroad lineman Tzanko has his life upended by the machinations of a rapaciously ambitious PR demon named Julia and her squad of incompetent flunkies. The two main actors are superb in their starkly different, yet completely interdependent, roles, and the supporting cast members do a fine job portraying a motley crew of hoodlums, cowards, bureaucrats and other assorted scum. The camera-work is very good -- it's mostly hand-held and the carefully modulated restlessness perfectly complements the edgy narrative. The editing is brilliant... somehow it lends an understated note to a story that, less deftly handled, would be too obvious, too blunt. I almost didn't get to see this movie and feel very happy I did. It reminds me another excellent recent release, "Toni Erdmann," except that the behavior on display here is even worse and the stakes are much higher. Do yourself a favor and see "Glory."

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• No Good Deed Ever Goes Unpunished

  reidandgenene2017-04-30

  This is a movie about a simple, honest man who gets caught up in and ground up by PR hype, investigative journalism, politics, corruption, and, in general, the modern world of which he is not really a part. I won't recount the plot, but for me, things took a fairly predictable path from start to finish. That's not a bad thing, but it's nice to have a few surprises. The two main characters are well acted.

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