A wonderful scene in this enchanting story of dashed dreams and lurking luck, directed by Stephan Komandarev and based on an autobiographical novel by Bulgarian-German writer Ilija Trojanow, sums up the irony of modern-day Bulgaria.

A petty but brutal state security chief - perhaps the term "little Stalin" would be appropriate here - slaps our rebellious, backgammon-loving anti-hero Bai Dan (Miki Manojlovic) in the face for his insolence. Judging by real-life events woven into the fiction - for example the tears forcibly extracted from bewildered factory workers at the time of Leonid Brezhnev’s death - this is circa 1983.

Fast forward a quarter of a century, a decade after the collapse of communism and shortly after Sofia’s EU accession. Bai Dan is returning to Bulgaria with his grandson. As they enter Bulgaria - and the undulating hills and lush countryside paint an idyllic picture - a roadside poster presumably of an aspiring politician, with a dazzling Colgate-white smile, welcomes them to the "new" Bulgaria. The man is the same security chief who struck Bai Dan. "Plus ca change. c’est plus la meme chose," or put another way, only in Bulgaria does the adage "out with the old, in with the new", mean more of the same.

The supreme irony of moments like this could be lost on foreign audiences who probably think that Bulgaria’s bad guys were rounded up and summarily dispatched, Ceausescu-like, in 1989.

Chance
Back to the 1980s. After Vasko (Hristo Mutafchiev) is pressurised by the state to spy on his father-in law, Bai Dan, he and his wife Yana (Ana Papadopulu) and young son (played as a boy by Blagovest Mutafchiev) decide to flee Bulgaria. After a hazardous escape and a stroke of luck when a machine gun-wielding border guard turns a blind eye to the young family, they land in an Italian refugee camp. Unfortunately, life turns out to be an endless bowl of (not very appetising) spaghetti which leaves the family more depressed than ever. In fact, they could be forgiven for thinking that they have merely swapped Bulgarian martinets for Italian ones.

When the family leave the camp for a day and walk around the central piazza of Trieste they come face to face with Western materialism. A glint of envy overcomes them as they gaze into the chic stores. The lot of the displaced refugee is a hard one. They turn around to see that little Sashko has disappeared. When they find him a little later their joy is much greater than if they had raided an entire Armani store.

It’s only thanks to Vasko’s skills at backgammon, acquired from his father-in-law, that they get enough money to pay for a ride to Germany. Backgammon is used as both a plot device and a motif throughout, providing Sashko with his inner moral compass: "We don’t play for money, only for honour," says Bai Dan. 

Sashko’s parents are subsequently killed in a car crash and the boy, now a young man played by a different actor, Carlo Ljubek, is stricken with amnesia following the accident. His grandfather comes to rescue him and coax out some memories. So begins a voyage of spiritual enlightenment that takes them on a trans-European bicycle trip back to Bulgaria. Bai Dan gently prods the young man to find himself, berating him for not pursuing a young girl at a campsite who obviously likes him. Needless to say, he does and within what seems like a few minutes they are at it in a lake. Ah, don’t you just love movies?!

Acceptance
Perhaps the most poignant moment occurs when Sashko returns to the Italian refugee camp with his grandfather. After a gap of more than 20 years a familiar face greets them, a Bulgarian Ivo Chikagoto (Vasil "Zueka" Vasilev) who had dreamed of a new life in the US. Sadly, it appears that poor Ivo, who had regaled former inmates with constant stories of how marvellous the US was, had remained at the camp. "It’s crazy over there (in the US), they’ll shoot you and your family dead for no reason," Ivo tells Sashko.

In the midst of great disappointment human beings learn to rationalise their lost hopes. Or put another way, when you can’t have what you want, you must learn to put up with what you have.

I won’t quibble over-much about a few events that do threaten to suspend disbelief. Would Bai Dan really be fit to travel on a two-seater bicycle all the way back to Bulgaria from Germany? Actually, of course, the actor who plays him (and it must be said exudes a great deal of charm even if his characterisation occasionally spills over into an Inspector Clouseau lookalike) is really Serbian and only in his late 50s and not old enough to be Sashko’s grandfather. And the actor who plays Sashko (Ljubek) is the German-born son of Croatian migrants.

Nevertheless, the film is a welcome change from the usual Hollywood rough-and-tumble fare. Despite a rather uneven pace and occasional jarring as the action switches from the past to the present, this is a life-affirming movie somewhat reminiscent of Roberto Benigni’s Life Is Beautiful with the message that a fight is never over until you hear the last bell.