The Best of the Best
London Greek Film Festival 2013
Special Screenings of the 2013 Awarded Films
[Friday, 6 December 2013]
19:00
Daphne (not in your eyes). Directed by Danae Papaioannou. Greece / France, 2011. 3.48′
New Director Award
The sounds of Athens. A foreign reporter struggling to produce her story in the middle of the riots. The empty streets of Paris. A house. A bedroom, a kitchen. Two worlds brought into one. A Greek girl, keeping up to her morning habits, while things back home explode. A mysterious connection between her actions and the reporters voice. As if she could hear it all. As if she could feel the teargas in her own eyes. As if she truly was there.
Do you remember when we used to go to the sea? Directed by Eleanna Santorinaiou. 14.24′
New Director Award
A young woman is trapped between the past and the present due to her mother’s Alzheimer’s. She has to make the biggest decision of her life about her future. The question is if she is ready to leave the past.
Dimitris Papadoulis – The multiple gift. Directed by Stella Alisanoglou. Greece, 2013. 67′
Best Creative Documentary
Life itself is a gift. There are times when an illness seems to “undermine” life or our relationships with other people. And when everything looks bleak, the illness freezes in the face of hope, of love, of the power of life, of man himself. Dimitris Papadoulis is 50 years old and suffers from MS. He can’t move. He lives beyond medical predictions and writes books. He goes against all odds.
20.30
Greeks on uncertain flight. Directed by Abdolreza Kohanrouz. Greece, 2012. 75′
Best Music (Sakis Tsilikis & Yiannis Lascaris)
A beautiful country, a historical place, with an ancient culture at the threshold of bankruptcy. The people are like numbed body parts. They are worried and they are trying to recover from the horrible financial crisis which they are experiencing. It is obvious that they don’t even have the mood to talk, much less to go against this situation, as they should.
Mitsigan – Hardships & Beauties. Directed by Kimon Tsakiris. Greece, 2013. 60′
Best Documentary, Best Music (Nassos Sopilis)
Mitsos “Mitsigan” Tsiganos, is a modern day Greek cowboy, an empirical philosopher and the owner of one of the biggest farms in southwestern Greece, named “Hardships & Beauties”. Things are going well when all of a sudden, Mitsos is struck simultaneously by both a professional and a personal crisis. He decides to leave his farm and takes a trip to meet with old friends and new people. His road trip in the heart of Greece becomes a symbolical trip into a country that will never be the same again.
22.45
10th day. Directed by Vassilis Mazomenos. Greece, 2012. 83′
Best Fiction Feature Film, Best Directing (Vassilis Mazomenos), Best Photography (George Papandrikopoulos)
Ali, an Afghan Muslim, lives in Athens Greece. He is trying to get access to the western dream, surrounded by memories of his homeland, his trip to Europe and his «nightmares».
[Sunday, 8 December 2013]
20.00
Plato likens the human soul with a cage, where knowledge is birds flying. We’ re born with the cage empty and, as we grow, we collect birds and they go in the cage for future use. When we need to access knowledge we put our hand in the cage, hunt for a bird, and sometimes catch the wrong one.
Ornithology uses the term “Zugunruhe” to describe the turbulent behaviour of birds before they migrate, whether free or caged.
These two images, birds inhabiting the human soul and the distress of the migrating bird became the starting points for this film, commissioned on the theme of Emigration.
A flock of birds circles and moves a cage vehicle, seeking escape from a city half finished and abandoned, with roads interrupted by fragments of fallen statues. Those hands are simultaneously the pursuit of knowledge and also the heroes/leaders of the past that we have rejected but are still haunting us.
In a time when Europe seems to be imploding, this is my portrait of Athens.
Grey route. Directed by Andy Papadimitriou. Greece, 2012. 23′
Honorary Award (Nikitas Tsakiroglou)
Alexis, a young self-confident and secure, falls in love with Cynthia. Together they experience a fairytale love planning a common course. But the dream is cut short for Alexis after splitting with Cynthia as a result the emotional frustration and resignation. An allegorical journey begins for Alexis with people – stations that affect a young person’s life. In a hazy landscape, by the crisis of days to create dead ends in his path, our hero must overcome the difficulties in front of him and find the strength to continue. Will Alex get out of the resignation and claim? What role will people – stations play in the life of the protagonist?
Perspectives. Directed by Alexandros Papathanasiou. Greece, UK, 2013. 19.42′
Honorary Award (Kostas Kazakos)
Poetry derives from the Greek roots meaning “making” and “creating”. The fight for a social change can be poetic and creative like a great piece of art.
Perspectives is the portrait of a prolific Greek stage director and actor, Kostas Kazakos, who produces radical political theatre on moments of social and financial furnace in Greece. In 1973 Mr Kazakos’ response on the dictatorship’s oppression was to produce theatre of protest as well as a theatre of social and cultural awakening against the military regime. Today he orientates himself in a similar condition that is under the current financial and political regimes.
Perspectives is a lyrical and colorful depiction of a dramatical social reality. It is no more than an individual’s story with a social meaning.
Volcano. Directed by Aris Fatouros. Greece, 2003. 13′.
(Special screening in London, not in competition)
21.15
Special Honorary Odysseus Awards Ceremony 2013.
The Ceremony includes a music performance by Sakis Tsilikis & Dimitris Psarianos. (Bookings will take place in turn of priority. Booking is necessary.)
Information – Bookings at the Foundation’s Box Office (Piraeus 206, Tavros) and over phone 210 3418579 Mon-Fri 11:00 – 14:00. Bookings will take place in turn of priority. Booking is necessary.
