Svetat e Golyam i Spasenie Debne Otvsyakade / The World is Big and Salvation Lurks Around the Corner (Stephan Komandarev, 2008): Bulgaria

Reviewed by Paula Gomez. Viewed at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival, 2010.

The World is Big and Salvation Lurks Around the Corner. That is the message of the movie by the same title. By watching this movie the viewer may laugh and cry and be appalled and smile for it is a very well made drama about a boy who grows up confused and tries to find himself with the help of his caring and loving grandfather.

The director (Stephan Komandarev), was inspired to film this enchanting story from the novel by Ilija Trojanow. It took the effort of three other writers (Yurii Dachev, Stephan Komandarev, and Dusan Milic) to adapt it into a screenplay and help make it the fabulous movie that it has become. This film was viewed at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival.

Sashko (Carlo Ljubek) a man in his early thirties, has a terrible car accident that leaves him with retrograde amnesia. His grandfather Bai Dan (Miki Manojlovic), who lives in Bulgaria, is notified of this event and goes out to fetch him at a hospital in Germany. Eventhough Sashko has a hard time remembering events prior to his accident, and that he even has a grandfather, he accepts to go with Bai Dan on a journey back to where he was born, Bulgaria. During this journey he tries to remember with the help of his caring grandfather, who he was and who he is from then on. The themes of: love, family, and self discovery are dominant in this movie. An unforgettable scene that displays the theme of self discovery well, is that in which Sashko as a boy, plays a game of backgammon with his grandpa and throws an unfavorable set of dice. Sashko become worried at the thought of loosing, so his grandpa tells him that there is no such thing as a bad throw of dice but instead bad players. Throughout the rest of the movie, his grandpa reinforces the idea to him that there is no wrong situation but instead the opportunity to change one’s approach or strategy in order to proceed and live our lives without being too overwhelmed or confused.

This seems to be a lesson-giving movie.  The viewer is immersed in a world in which the grandpa plays the caretaker role and the viewer becomes Sashko. We remember the events of Sashko’s life along with him and become  sad and upset at his misfortunes, but then his grandpa helps us to see the light at the other end of the tunnel. He helps us to remember the lesson that the world is big and the solution to our problems is not too far away from us if we only change our strategies. The pride of being alive can be immense and this movies shows us that very elegantly. The scenes of Sashko’s past are displayed in yellow tones with a very little hue and contrast. The scenes of his current life, on the other hand, have a lot more color and a type of vivid documentary camera movement style to them. This visual distinction perhaps symbolizes that Sashko’s current life is more fragile than his memories for he is living it in the present and anything good or bad can happen to him. His memories are just recollections of emotional highlights in his life. Therefore, although his memories are precious in his mind, his life in the now is what should matter to him the most.

The plot has some similarities with the movie Memento. A large part of the movie is dedicated to scenes that happened throughout the life of Sashko before his accident. Both main characters in each movie have a type of memory loss and are in search for something that is missing in their life: something to resolve. To Sashko, that something is self-discovery.

I recommend this movie to anyone looking for inspiration to overcome personal struggles. It is a very well made movie complicated enough and yet simple enough to entertain most audience members. It allows one to remember that the world is imense, that many things can happen good and bad that may confuse the self, but that if one lives with full emotion, wit, and strategy, they can overcome any hardship in their lives and live content.