Film Screening: Дами Канят (1980) /100 Years Bulgarian Cinema/

A charming driving instructor, divorced and poor, flirts with his numerous female students all of the time. No matter of age, occupation or marital status as if all the bored women in this town court this country “Don Juan”. Finally, he loses control over the attacks of his suitors…

 

The film belongs to the group of the so-called Bulgarian Cult Comedies Stream that burst out during the first half of the 1980s but starting from the previous decade. Amidst the notable ones can be listed: Something out of Nothing (1979), The Double (1980), A Nameless Band (1982), Dangerous Charm (1984) and the sequence about The Past-Master (1970–1983)

 

Naturally, the film gave one of the all time famous quotes, as usual by the well-known Rusev and Todev.

 

The driving instructor Yakim Donev (Danailov) just divorced his wife leaving her all his modest assets. For giving the assets he is blamed by his uncle (Todev) every time when Donev visited him. The town, he lives and works in, seems to be small and boring so he enters in endless flirt relations with his female students. There is no matter of age or occupancy, of physical appearance or marital status. All the women who tries to obtain a driving license becomes his suitors. The funny situations file one after the other. From a barely aged 18 girl (Puncheva) to an overage fatty Missus (Todorova), from two sisters-in-law (Kokanova/Statulova) to an unemployed young housewife (Dimitrova),from a research worker (Toncheva) to an artist’s wife (Maneva). The acts are sometimes spiced by jealous husbands as the lawyer Baltiev (Rusev). The rope around the neck of the “Don Juan” tightens. Maybe the reason is in him but maybe in the women, all of whom fight for his attention. The chase is over with drama for all of them, with a thin tread of irony.