Greek director Costas Zapas and Israeli filmmaker Lior Shamriz gave a press conference on Wednesday, November 7, in the context of the 53rd Thessaloniki International Film Festival. Festival director Dimitri Eipides attended. The Festival is hosting a tribute to the work of the two filmmakers, which is part of the Festival’s new section “Night views”.
In his opening remarks, Mr. Eipides said: “It is with great pleasure that I welcome for the first time two directors who had not participated in the Festival before. They are here on the occasion of our new emphasis to modern alternative cinema, which is groundbreaking, flawless and without hidden agendas. I have great faith in the alternative approach of issues and was personally shaped by independent cinema and the US underground scene. My very first cinematic experiences, that gave birth to my first strong emotions, were films which shattered all barriers, limitations and difficulties, suggesting a new worldview and created by rebellious and talented filmmakers”.
Presenting the two filmmakers, Mr. Eipides said: “Greece also has such talents, like Mr. Zapas. He is a new friend of the Festival, and I have great faith in his movies; I always look forward to his next work. Lior Shamriz comes from Israel, or I should say Berlin. I have great appreciation for his work and anticipate more great things in the future from him. He has already done great things at the Reykjavik Festival“. Mr. Eipides added that “the new section of the Festival marks a new beginning; the section will develop and become richer in the years to come. I hope the two artists who are with us today will keep returning here with their new films. I hope they come to love the Festival and Thessaloniki and become our good friends”.
In his opening remarks, Mr. Zapas said: “I wish to personally thank Mr. Eipides. I believe he took a bold step when he invited me. My work has found lots of support abroad, but none whatsoever in Greece; I believe this is the first - and indeed a very bold one - step towards finding support in my own country”. Lior Shamriz also expressed his appreciation for being invited and being able to attend the Festival.
Commenting on the meaning of the term “underground” in the movie industry, Costas Zapas argued that both it and the term ‘avant-garde’ are misunderstood: “That which is genuinely groundbreaking in its time, later becomes classic. We know of great directors who were at first unable or faced great difficulty to reach a wider audience later acknowledged as having produced classic cinema and becoming reference points”. Commenting on the same issue, Mr. Shamriz said: “The term underground has two dimensions: one relates to a cinematic tradition, which includes Andy Warhol and Jonas Mekas; this is a tradition I often refer to in my movies; the other dimension is more straightforward; it relates to a filmmaker’s unwillingness to adhere to the established means of production. I try to produce the movies I want. I have my own agenda, the things I want to talk about and this means I have to do things my way - a way which is perceived by others as being underground. I am fine with this, but I do not aim for these characterizations - they are labels used by others. I think about and select my themes without making compromises. Films are the mirror of a filmmaker’s course“.
With regard to traditional cinema education, Mr. Zapas said: “I do not understand what cinema education means. I believe that the job of a filmmaker, of any artist, is to take what is invisible and make it visible, in other words to turn the mundane into something epic. How can you teach that? We do not chose to do this job, the job is the one selecting us. I had no choice but to become a filmmaker”. Mr. Shamriz explained on the same issue: “I did not get any formal cinema education, but I am literate in the arts and I currently see my work as being in the middle of these two fields. There are conceptual issues I want to express on the screen and some traditional film languages I want to process. But I believe this combination works for me, since it is not my intention to imitate 20th century art“. Commenting on the issue of keeping a balance between narration and experimentation, Lior Shamriz said: “I recently realized that striking a balance is not something I want to pursue. I want to mix these two elements. I am not trying to add experimental elements to my stories; I look for something in between, or maybe a combination of the two. It resembles the relation between nature and God”.
Talking about the film he is preparing, Frankenstein: A Death Odyssey, which is a film adaptation of the Frankenstein story, Mr. Zapas said: “first of all, I would like to talk about Mary Shelley, who was a great writer. Together with her husband, the great poet Percy Shelley, and their close friend Lord Byron, she was one of the damned poets. I made an adaptation of Frankenstein’s myth for the modern age, something Hollywood has been trying to do for years. Less than a year ago the script was ready, and was met with great enthusiasm. It was one of the twelve best scripts selected at Toronto. Distinguished contributors were drawn to the film by the script, including Shigeru Umebayashi, who will compose the original score, Steven Berkoff, who is cast in one of the main roles, as well as Panagiotis Rappas, the internationally acclaimed Greek animator, who specializes in special effects and has been collaborating with Steven Spielberg for over a decade. More contributors will be announced soon. This is a very ambitious and hopefully successful project”.
Talking about his latest short film, Beyond Love and Companionship, which was completed only days before the opening of the Festival and will be screened for a world premiere in Thessaloniki, Mr. Shamriz said: “When I received the invitation from the Thessaloniki Festival, and was informed that the organizers were planning a tribute to my work, I was in the middle of creating a short film. When I told the organizers about it, they suggested I include this film in the tribute; this accelerated its completion. I often enjoy making films for specific people. If I meet an interesting actor or an artist I would like to work with, I enjoy writing a story with him or her in mind. Things also happen in the reverse order, with me writing the story and then looking for the appropriate people. But I am interested in this mixture of life and Art, being able to write something for a specific person. For example, my film The Magic Desk was filmed with actress Carola Regnier in her house, without me even seeing it beforehand. I enjoy making ‘holes’ in the fabric of reality and plugging them with my films, hoping I can recover the fabric and make it look real”.
Shamriz was born in Israel, but lives and works in Berlin. Talking about this choice, he explained: “I hope I can one day make films in Israel as well. But it is difficult to produce art there. In Germany it is easier to produce independent, experimental work. It was an interesting experience for me to move to Berlin and come to contact with people from all around the world”. He added that “for me it is very important to make my work in the same place I live. I disapprove of the exoticism of some directors, the practice of imports-exports, where you go to some exotic location, produce some reality and then sell it to the market. I have often seen this practice in Israel. There is funding from rich European countries; they look for stories, but the end result is always artificial”.
Mr. Zapas explained why he chose Athens to be the locus of his artistic work: “I do not take part in the personal mythology of anyone, not even my own, so I would not film a city for its mythology. I insist on filming in Greece despite the difficulties, because I believe obstacles have always existed and will continue to exist. To quote the poet, ‘the city will follow you’. I don’t believe that someone’s glance can change a place or that another city can change the person. My upcoming film is a big bet, because the script attracted the interest even of big Hollywood studios. But I believed that during these hard times, Greece can still give birth to great things and that it has been too long since we last exported something. This is why I persevere, despite the hardships”.
Commenting on the attitudes towards Greece he encounters in Festivals abroad, Mr. Zapas said: “Things are very bad, I definitely do not want to soften the reality. We are stigmatized abroad. If you call to ask for funding and say you are Greek, it is worse than telling them you are… the Antichrist. Things are extremely difficult, but I believe in our mettle as individuals and as a people”.
Mr. Shamriz talked about his own experiences from festivals with regard to his country of origin. “We face a similar situation in Israel. According to my limited experience, I would say it is very tempting for a filmmaker to satisfy the audience’s predispositions about a place. But for me it is important that the filmmaker does all he can to adopt a wider point of view and focus on what he believes is right from an ideological and artistic point of view, and not adhere to others’ expectations. I hope this is just a passing phase and that it becomes for example easier for me to make a movie about the war and manage to find a market for it. In Israel many people serve in the army, take part in the atrocities and then make a movie they can sell. I did not take part in the war, nor do I want to make a film about the war. If you believe there is more to life than conforming, then you must not yield. Those cheering you for conforming are not on your side“.
