Festival films

In a working-class neighborhood of Athens, amid the economic crisis, the resurgence of fascism, and Covid-19, a group of 18-year-old students persecute immigrants, queers, anyone who is just different. A classmate of theirs, who refuses to hide his dislike for their action, quickly becomes their target.

To provide a better life for his family in the country, 18-year-old Mateus accepts a job in a junkyard in São Paulo for his new boss, Luca. But when he and a few other boys become trapped in the dangerous world of human trafficking, Mateus will be forced to decide between working for the very man who imprisoned him or risk his and his family’s future.

Stomping, whomping, stealing, singing, tap-dancing, violating, Derby-topped teddy-boy hooligan Alex has his own way of having a good time. He has it at the tragic expense of others. Alex’s journey from amoral punk to brainwashed proper citizen forms the dynamic arc of Stanley Kubrick’s future-shook vision of Anthony Burgess’s novel. Unforgettable images, startling musical counterpoints, the fascinating language used by Alex and his pals – Kubrick shapes them into a shattering whole.

A trip in a world of artworks belonging to the Teloglion Foundation of Arts collection. With a pseudo-single shot, the camera moves continuously forward through a scenery inspired by the collection’s artists from the 17th century to our days.

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Ecaterina, a high school Religion teacher and wife of the town priest, gets involved with Iuliu, a 16-year-old student with a troubled past. Ecaterina tries to keep him under control, but she loses her own sense of control in this process. As Ecaterina faces a genuine crisis of faith, Iuliu’s infatuation turns increasingly dangerous when he takes his sins to the priest – and her own husband.

A mystical travelogue, a journey to find that place of connection, of clarity, of understanding across language, geography, and experience. The thoughts, ideas, and dreams of protagonists in ten countries spanning five continents are revealed through conversation, activity, and contemplation. These collective stories serve as pieces of a puzzle that lead to what the Argentinean writer Jorge Luis Borges called “the unimaginable universe.“ Aleph blends cinematic elements of narrative fiction and magic realism and the rigor and mechanics of documentary practice to explore the dreams, stories, preoccupations, thoughts, and lived and imagined experiences of its protagonists – actors, performers, musicians and non-professionals. A unique narrative that introduces us to a different understanding of meaning itself, both revelation and challenge – a venture achieved through play with uncertainty and serendipity.

Michel, a lethal womanizer, meets online the introverted Gloria and lures her in a chaotic night, filled with lust and blood, turning her into an accomplice to his crimes. The psychopath lovers embark on a deadly journey full of wild sex, rampant jealousy, and passionate dives into the abyssal depths of their darkest instincts. Partly based on the true story of Raymond Fernandez and Martha Beck (known as “The Lonely Hearts Killers”), who are rumored to have killed twenty women in the US over a period of two years from 1947 to 1949, a horror film in which perversion, hedonism, gore, and melancholy flirt continuously.

Amira, a 17-year-old Palestinian, was conceived with the smuggled sperm of her imprisoned father, Nawar. Although their relationship since birth has been restricted to prison visits, he remains her hero. His absence in her life is over-compensated with love and affection from those surrounding her. But when a failed attempt to conceive another child reveals Nawar’s infertility, Amira’s world turns upside down. A sensitive microcosmic exploration of the division and xenophobia that exists in today’s world, and at the same time a fascinating portrait of a powerful woman and a whole country in an impasse.

Two sisters, Anna and Melina, spend the last days of summer at their summer house in Nea Makri. Anna is having a party for her 18th birthday and all she wants is to spend her day with Maria, her summer flirt. Melina loves Anna obsessively and does not understand why she is not invited to the party. But she knows that as a party crasher she can make this night unforgettable for her older sister.

At Turkey’s oldest zoo, a lonely manager and a withdrawn female officer form an unlikely bond: as they hide the death of the zoo’s oldest inhabitant, an Anatolian leopard, in order to stop the privatization process and fake its escape, they set in motion an absurd charade that spins out of control. In Turkey’s grey and quiet capital, the ghost of the leopard persists.

13-year-old Ramin Mehdipour and his Iranian family have been living in a refugee center in Finland. Just as Ramin starts to enjoy the school holidays, the family receives the terrible news their asylum application has been denied. The Mehdipours file a final appeal, and they continue with their everyday lives, trying to keep a positive attitude despite the looming danger of deportation. As Ramin starts the new school year, every moment, every friendship will be more precious than ever.

A grandson returns to his ancestors’ village for the winter. A grandfather returns from death to see his grandson for one last time. A village that is unable to cope with the returns that occurred out of love.

Siblings Paul and Irina grow up on a remote Greek island, as members of a religious community led by a mysterious guru named Fust. When Fust invites Irina to join him by his side, Paul feels abandoned. He must free his sister before it is too late – for the sect is already preparing its deadly end.

Karim is the next big thing in the Parisian literary salons; a young Arab that has sneaked into the high-life of the intellectual elite, living his dream. However, the past lurks around the corner. Arthur Rambo, his online alter ego from long-forgotten times, hiding homophobic and antisemitic jokes under his belt, steps out of the virtual shadows, threatening to tear down Karim’s current success. In today’s world, where online personas have substituted our real image, scripta manent: they persist and they hurt. No mistake can be erased, no sin is forgiven.

Strahinya and his wife, Ababuo, both 28 years old, left Ghana at the beginning of the migrant crisis. They managed to reach Germany but were deported back to Belgrade. Strahinya does his best to start a new life in this city. He works hard to secure asylum, trying out as a football player for a local club and working as a volunteer for the Red Cross. The process, however, is lengthy and Ababuo, a passionate woman aspiring to become an actress in London, feels unfulfilled in their life. One night, a new group of Syrian refugees arrive, on their way to Western Europe. One of them is Ali, a charismatic left-wing activist. Ababuo initially mocks him, but, the very next day, leaves Serbia with him, providing no explanation. Strahinya sets off along the Balkan migrant route for completely different reasons than anyone else: for love. A reimagining of the medieval Serbian epic poem "Banovich Strahinya" in which contemporary African migrants take the place of Serbian national heroes. Urgent and timeless at the same time, this adaptation raises questions about identity, tradition, race, and love.

At the bottom of mount Helmos, far away from the city and the remains of the past urban glory, and somewhere in the heart of the Greek countryside, Astero and Thymios exchange vows for eternal love. Thymios’s father believes that Astero is not the right person for his son, threatening to disinherit him if he marries Astero. Destiny and prejudice seem to keep the lovers apart. Will they ever meet again? Loosely based on the novel “Ramona” by Helen Hunt Jackson (which narrates the story of a forbidden love set in the U.S.), this historically important film is set in the Greek countryside, where many of the popular productions of that period were set. The country, from the urban center to the countryside, was steeped into a sociopolitical crisis (in the film, Astero’s uncle is a political prisoner in Athens and his fortune determines the fate of the characters), so the “foustanella” sub-genre becomes popular as the main tool for escape. Gaziadis composes a small pastoral epic tale in three acts, where social classes and erotic passion set the tone of a melodrama with heroes who seem determined to go against their own destiny. Elements with timeless value – just like the shift from “Ramona” to “Foustanella” – which are fundamental for the narrative and cross borders and seasons. The film, lost for decades, had a successful box office remake in 1959 directed by Dinos Dimopoulos, starring Aliki Vougiouklaki. Until a copy of the film with French intertitles was found in the Cinémathèque Française in 2003. Now the film is also available accompanied by the music composed by Nalyssa Green for the screenings of Motherland, I See You event.
The film will be shown in a restored digital copy (DCP) created in 2003 by the Greek Film Archive in collaboration with the French Film Archive with Greek intertitles and English subtitles.

ADMISSION IS FREE FOR THE PUBLIC, ON A FIRST-COME-FIRST SERVED BASIS

Summer is a permanent state of mind in Limassol, a once small seaside town in Cyprus that has transformed into the oligarch paradise of the Mediterranean. Being both a player and a victim of this city’s transformation as a food stylist, Tina is depressed. On the day of her birthday, she is ready to give up on everything, until an extraordinary encounter changes her life.

Ahmed, 18, French of Algerian origin, grew up in the suburbs of Paris. At the university, he meets Farah, a young Tunisian girl, full of energy, who has just arrived in Paris. While discovering a corpus of sensual and erotic Arabic literature he never imagined existed, Ahmed falls hard in love with Farah, and although literally overwhelmed with desire, he will try to resist it.

In Venice, beyond gondolas, canals where tourists come and locals go, there is a parallel world where teenagers pimp up their motorboats, customizing them with dazzling LED lights and powerful stereo systems, turning their barchini into tokens of coolness and virility. Two of these boys will risk their lives in one psychedelic race, chased by police toward the heart of Venice. The decline that erodes the relationships, environment, and habits of a rootless generation unfolds against the backdrop of timeless Venetian landscape, in a film that began without a screenplay and developed over four years of quiet observation by a master of contemporary documentary.

Mina’s life is turned upside down when she learns that her husband Babak was innocent of the crime for which he was executed. The authorities apologize for the mistake and offer the prospect of financial compensation, but Mina starts a silent battle against a cynical system for her own and her daughter's sake. Just as her money is running out, a stranger named Reza knocks at her door, saying he has come to repay a debt he owed to Babak. Mina is guarded at first, but she increasingly lets Reza into her life, unaware of the secret that ties them to one another. A devastatingly timely film about the power of the individual against the crushing powers that be, a skillful, affective study on the inextricable human bonds that traverse time and space.

Footage from the south of Ecuador, merged with fragments from 1950s US documentaries for children about the origins of “bananas” and other propaganda sources, are the starting point for this ambiguous film that attempts to rearticulate a painful story. Part of the footage was shot in the diorama museum of Guayaquil, often depicting the farmers from a Western, colonialist perspective that presents them as heroic sufferers.

ADMISSION IS FREE FOR THE PUBLIC, ON A FIRST-COME-FIRST SERVED BASIS