Angel Wagenstein: Art Is a Weapon

Few filmgoers are likely to be acquainted with the work of Bulgarian writer-director Angel Wagenstein, who was 94 when filmmaker Andrea Simon made this revealing documentary. Wagenstein is a fascinatingly complex figure whose life and career have been inextricably bound up with the vicissitudes of his country’s history. Because of his father’s devotion to Marxism the family emigrated to France, and when Wagenstein returned to his homeland he joined in anti-fascist activities that nearly led to his execution in 1944. After the war, he studied filmmaking in Moscow, but once back in Bulgaria he became a leading figure among intellectuals who criticized the country’s Stalinist rulers, eventually leading to his expulsion from the party. Wagenstein’s films obliquely criticized the regime—such as Aesop (1970), coming only two years after the Soviet-led invasion of Czechoslovakia, in which the ancient Greek sage Aesop suffered death for opposing an autocratic foreign king’s attempt to impose his control on the island of Samos. But Wagenstein also supported the liberalized Bulgarian Communist government of the 1980s, for which he was condemned after its collapse in 1990. Art Is a Weapon has a strong autobiographical component due to the lengthy interview excerpts with Wagenstein, which are combined with archival material, clips from his movies, and commentary by friends, collaborators, and film historians. An engrossing portrait of a significant figure in Eastern European post-war cinema, this is highly recommended. Aud: C, P. (F. Swietek)