Hunting Down Small Predators / Лов на дребни хищници (Bulgaria, 2010)

directed by Tsvetodar Markov, comedy/thriller, 95 min, eng subtitles
written by Hristian Nochev
with Marian Vulev, Vladimir Georgiev, Silvia Petkova, Hristo Shopov

A group of friends meets a shy young man with communication problems who has just fallen in love at first sight. The teenagers start haning out together and next moment, they decide to commit a petty crime in order to raise money for a seaside holiday but their plot to kidnap a wealthy old lady's cats brings them dangerously close to a mobster and drug trafficker, and they might just find themselves in a spot of trouble deeper than they could have imagined.

Director Tsvetodar Markov's first feature film presents an amalgam of love and despair, hope and disillusionment, revenge and revelation. Throughout the film, the story veers wildly between violence and black humor, suspense and farcical comedy. A drugs haul, a gangsters shooting and a bloody bath set up the underworld theme, while a practical joke involving the kidnapping of cats anchors the comedy, leaving a would-be lover waiting on a park bench with a bouquet for his beloved at the exact center of the plot.

Awards:

Official selections in IFF: Chicago 2011, Buenos Aires 2011, Chennai 2011
Warsaw 2010, Segovia 2010, Kiev 2010