TALES FROM THE BALKANS

After more than 100 years the 1912–1913 Balkan wars are still firmly engraved in the minds and hearts of the people in that region. Stories by word-of mouth, personal mementoes of war heroes and family legends are handed down from generation to generation thus keeping forgetfulness away and history alive. In those times four small countries – Bulgaria, Greece, Serbia and Montenegro allied in a Balkan League to achieve what seemed an unfeasible aim – defeat the huge Ottoman Empire. They did, but the exploit ended in a fratricide war among themselves. Mutual hatred, lack of confidence and neighborly hostilities have branded the lives of generations to come. The film plot is built upon a trip of war refugee descendants visiting the native villages of their grandparents. This is a film tour in history, a story about the familiar Balkan wars depicted with unfamiliar archive footage, with memories of witnesses and descendants of refugees and the analyses of Bulgarian, Greek and Turkish historians. A chronicle of the birth, the rise and the crash of Bulgarian national ideal, a story without upbeat fanfares, without popular myths and nostalgia, without call for vengeance.  This is a story of the war as pain and bitter stigma, which accounts, in more than one way, for the national character and the Balkan fate.