Amateur Cinema in Bulgaria

Abstract

This chapter traces Bulgarian amateur cinema’s development across four decades and how it engendered experimentation throughout this period. In the late 1950s, amateur output followed the dictates of socialist realism. Yet from the late 1960s onward, increasing openness, notably through international amateur film festivals, introduced experimentation in this circuit, yielding several noteworthy films in the 1970s and 1980s. Beyond conducting formal experiments, amateur films increasingly addressed societal crises in Socialist Bulgaria, from anti-war engagement to environmental issues, toeing the line between acceptable and politically subversive subject matter. The chapter, in addition to tracing formal and thematic developments, sketches how Bulgarian institutions of amateur film production were imbricated with a wide range of official infrastructures, while at times also functioning independently from them.