MAN IS NOT A BIRD (1965)

Told with an almost documentary style (lots of handheld cameras and tight indoor shots that make you feel like you're actually inside the room with the characters), MAN IS NOT A BIRD is the story of an engineer who comes to a small mining town in eastern Serbia to oversee the installation of some machinery. Without even trying, he starts a relationship with a beautiful hairdresser. Is she really into him or just looking for a way out of this filthy dead end town?

There's more going on than just the relationship between these two and director Dusan Makavejev captures it all beautifully: a worker who gives his wife's dresses to his mistress and the wife in turn beats the whore up in the town market; a singer getting stabbed in a bar brawl; workers stealing copper wire; the rush to get the machinery installed before schedule; a truck driver who's always on the prowl for some fresh trim; a hypnotist convincing people that they are birds, etc. I'm a huge fan of Emile Zola and even though this film was set 80 years after Zola's "Germinal", it reminded me a lot of that novel. Mostly with the interactions between the workers and how they all live in such close proximity that they all know each other business even down to the smallest details.

I enjoyed MAN IS NOT A BIRD.  The second half wasn't as good as the first half, but it's still in interesting picture.  I really liked the photography.  If you like realism and the documentary's of Werner Herzog and Errol Morris then I think you'll dig this as well.

ZIFT (2008)

It's not often that a film can successfully be both depressing and uplifting, but somehow ZIFT does it.

Moth (played perfectly by Zahary Baharov) is doing time in a post-WWII Bulgarian prison for a murder he didn't commit, but that's the least of his worries though because everybody thinks he knows the location of a large diamond that is rumored to have belonged to the guy Moth supposedly murdered.  He's released early by the crooked warden but his new found freedom is actually a one way trip to Hell.

In one of Moth's many flashbacks (sometimes there's even multiple flashbacks within flashbacks!!!) he remembers an old cell mate telling him about a sign on the exit door of a prison that read "Abandon all hope, ye who enter here." meaning the outside world. That proves to be only too true because Moth doesn't even make it out the door before all Hell breaks loose. It's great.

I love high-energy movies that keep you on your toes and constantly guessing and ZIFT does it perfectly from the opening scene (a guy emptying a sewage truck into somebody's apartment window) all the way to the final moment. I was having so much fun I completely lost track of time.

Not only is the story engaging and the acting impressive all around (including Tanya Ilieva, who might have the hottest body in the history of the universe), but the look and feel of the movie is exceptional. Cinematographer Emil Hristow throws in all kinds of great stuff.  So many great shots that there's no way you can soak it all in in just one sitting.  And that leaves us with director Javor Gardev who, according to IMDb, has only directed this movie!!!  ZIFT is 9 years old now (March, 2017), so how come he isn't busy with something else? That is very disappointing to read.

Intriguing story, lightening quick pace, nudity, violence, murder, perversion, torture, glass eyeball, grave digging, beautiful B & W photography, quirky characters.  Highly recommended.