A Thousand Suns Presents: We Were Young

'We Were Young' is set during the German occupation of Bulgaria in the 1940s. Here we follow a handful of young people who, with a mixture of idealism and uncompromising determination, are ready to sacrifice everything in the fight against the occupiers. Amid the political chaos that the newly founded resistance group finds itself in, love blossoms between Dymo and Veska. But their budding romance is threatened by the violence and injustice that surrounds them.

In slow zooms and large, haunting images, we are introduced to a desolate and devastated Sofia, where the young are forced to live in the shadows of the city, only just lit by the shear of their flashlights. With the young love during a brutal wartime as the focal point, Binka Zhelyazkova investigates the ultimate price of rebelling. Zhelyazkova herself was part of the resistance movement in Sofia during the German occupation, and it is close to seeing the film in light of her own experiences of the struggle and its many victims.

Director: Binka Zhelyazkova
Starring: Dimitar Buynozov, Rumyana Karabelova, Georgi Georgiev-Getz
Country/year: Bulgaria, 1961
Running time: 110 min.
Formato: DCP
Language: Bulgarian with English subtitles
Age limit: Allowed for children over 15
Original title: A byahme mladi

Part of the series: A Thousand Suns
Thousand suns is a film screening series in Copenhagen that aims to give an insight into the current state of film art and outline a direction for its future.