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Sunday, March 08, 2009

Bulgarian television to produce three films about medieval fortresses

BNT to Release Three Films Presenting Bulgarian Medieval Fortresses
4 March 2009
Bulgarian News Agency

High-quality films are the best promotional campaign of Bulgarian monuments of culture, Prof. Nikolai Ovcharov said at a news conference in BTA's National Press Club on Wednesday. He presented three new films of a Bulgarian National Television (BNT) team dedicated to medieval Bulgarian fortresses.

"We decided to place the scripts on a broad historical basis," said he. The first film of the series, "The Fortresses of Achridos", presents the emergence, existence and decline of the fortresses, built in the area of the Eastern Rhodopes - Perperikon, Ustram Vishergard and Lyutitsa up to Ivailovgrad, Mezek and Svilengrad - at the time of the Byzantine Empire and the Second Bulgarian State.

The second film, "Kaloyan's Campaign", dwells on the ruling of Kaloyan, who headed the uprising against the Byzantine occupation resulting in the restoration of the Bulgarian state. Part of the film was shot in Didymoteichon (Greece) and Edirne (Turkey), Ovcharov specified.

The third film, "The Ottoman Invasion", tracks the marches of the Ottoman Turks. The film was shot in the Pythion Fortress in Greece. It shows the first sultan's mosque in Europe, located in Didymoteichon, as well as the Selimiye mosque in Edirne.

Dessy Shishmanova, Director of BNT Studio in Plovdiv, said that there are plans to release the films on CD and dub them in foreign languages.