REDISCOVERING ANDREAS VELISSAROPOULOS’S OPERA

Lost for three decades and widely regarded, not without reason, as “the holy grail of Greek queer cinema,” Andreas Velissaropoulos’s Opera (1976) comes back into focus through recently discovered Super 8 footage from its shoot. It is an ideal opportunity to retrace the paths of a film we have never seen and to rediscover a director whose work deserves a fresh look. Following the first-ever screening of the footage, people who worked on the film, collaborators and friends of Andreas Velissaropoulos, and queer cinema scholars piece Opera back together, discuss its place in the history of Greek cinema, introduce a filmmaker who died too soon, and reflect on films that disappear yet keep insisting on their right to exist.

Speakers: Yannis Daskalothanasis (director of photography), Dimitris Xanthoulis (collector), Takis Spetsiotis (film director), Iris Zachmanidi (film director), Konstantinos Kyriakos (Theater History and Greek Cinema professor), Eleni Androutsopoulou (Head of Greek Film Festival). Moderator: Manolis Kranakis, film critic.

The discussion will be conducted in Greek with simultaneous interpretation in English.