Discoveries from Greece World Cinema

After the end of World War II, a Greek woman who was imprisoned in a German concentration camp returns to Greece. She is a woman broken by the hardships, but at the same time determined to find the man who caused her all this misery, namely the one who reported her to the Gestapo as a Jew.

Mihalis wakes up on another day of misery and melancholy until a special phone call drastically changes his life around.

In a desperate attempt to pay off his debts, Kostas decides to rob his best friend Vassilis.

The deterioration of Medea and Jason's relationship begins while they are waiting for their first child to be born.

When you get involved in a love triangle, it's sweet. But what happens when two sweethearts end up in your studio apartment? Ask the young writer, who got involved with not two, but three.

The life of St. Myrtidiotissa AKA St. Sophia of Kleisoura

The prodigal son Aimilios returns to his family, but the welcome he receives is cold. The only ray of light is Louisa, a youthful love interest. However, he eventually discovers that, due to the recklessness of others, Louisa is his sister, and that is when his problems begin...

A documentary about Eleusina. The past and the present, in complete antithesis, coexist in a place spoiled by modern industry but which long ago hosted the Eleusinian Mysteries, the secret ceremonies that initiated the ancient Greeks into the miracles of life, death and the afterlife.

A writer goes to his hometown, looking for the girl he was in love,when he was young.

After her father's mysterious death, Irini decides to return to her family home, where she now finds herself in the hands of her stepmother, Magda, and her half-brother, Lefteris. She quickly becomes aware of her stepmother's secret love affair with the enigmatic housekeeper, Panagiotis, which makes her suspicious. The same goes for young Lefteris' aversion to Panagiotis. With the law turning a blind eye to the case, she will use the only means she has to get her revenge.

In Athens in 2013, a taxi driver is unwittingly involved in a kidnapping by those who oppress him.

A farmer's wife is baking a cake for the feast of Saint Fanourios. Her little girl is playing under the table. But suddenly, the irrational bursts into the story, and all sorts of things happen during the feast.

In a dystopian society after an unexpected epidemic citizens can't have dreams. Only few people are privillaged to dream. They operate small underground companies where they can have other people dreams.

When Tamtakos' house is brought down by the bulldozer a record company makes him a proposition for a new band.

"The Poor Hunter of the South" is the title of the film Stavros Tornes never got to make, rightfully featured alongside his name on this documentary by Stavros Kaplanidis ("Canteen", "Play it Again, Christos"). The film traces his imagery, listens for his whispers and infiltrates the memories of his closest friends, looking for clues in order to piece together the portrait of a filmmaker who made something out of nothing and stayed true to himself and his vision until the very end. Besides Tornes' own films, this documentary includes footage from films where the "poor hunter" appeared as an actor, like "The Secret of the Red Cloak" by Kostas Fotinos, "Kierion" by Dimos Theos and " Allonsanfan" by Paolo and Vittorio Taviani.

Veroniki, a former actress, turns 80 today. Her great granddaughter, Vera, has made many preparations for the birthday in an attempt to communicate with Veroniki, who suffers from senile dementia. Among other things, Vera has prepared a game of memories. The youngest granddaughter, Danae, refuses to participate in the effort to activate Veronica, as she considers it useless. Will Vera be able to bring her grandmother back and remind her who she is? The film was made in the context of the 5th Panorama Film School of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki with the theme DEACTIVATION.

Raphael wanders his old high-school grounds reflecting on his first experiences of young love, with particular focus on the love triangle between himself, Hecate and Louca.

Almost a year after the global pandemic hit Greece, iMEdD and SmallPlanet, present Yorgos Avgeropoulos’ new documentary entitled “Parontes” (Present). The film, unfolds against the backdrop of the public healthcare system and follows the prominent figures at the forefront of the COVID-19 response, as well as the unsung heroes of the pandemic. Political decisions and backroom maneuvers come under the microscope and are juxtaposed with the struggles of those who bear the brunt of the new crisis on a daily basis. Through the Greek experience, Avgeropoulos manages to capture a universal reality and poses critical questions about the post-Covid era the world is entering.

A group of children living on the streets of Athens. Among them is Sayid, a twelve-year-old boy, who works all day selling sunflower seeds in the city’s parks and squares. His existence borders on absolute poverty, as he goes looking for food at soup kitchens. His daily routine in the chaotic capital of Greece is a continuous struggle for survival. At the same time, however, he manages to find and enjoy the freedom the city streets can offer. Sayid, along with his friends who are all immigrants from Afghanistan, escape their desperation by clinging onto their hopes. With them, he plays innocent childhood games and dreams of a better future: He wants to leave for Northern Europe, to go to school, and to get a decent job when he grows up. Sayid is trapped in Greece, a country plagued by a financial crisis, increasing unemployment, rampant xenophobia, and racist violence. Sayid doesn’t mince his words: “I’ve been here for about two years, and it feels like twenty.”

Natasha, daughter of shipowner Dimitrios, receives threatening phone calls. Her father decides to hire a bodyguard (Pavlos Evangelopoulos) to watch over her, on the condition that his daughter not find out, because he does not agree with the idea of a bodyguard. So, "by chance," the kids meet, hang out, and, inevitably, fall in love. But the guy threatening her has other plans...

Manolios decides to quit working on a ship and return to Crete so he can marry his beloved one, Lenio.

' Red string tied, wrapped in the creel, please turn kicks tale n'archinisei 'used to say older before they start their tales. But Knit Red Thread of Costas Charalambous does not narrate a tale but a nightmare that haunts the Greek history for more than 60 year. The nightmare of civil war.

In the Cretan villages of the White Mountains, women preserve the rich tradition of the land with maturity and creativity. Over the years, the Cretan “petseta” has become a very important part of their dowry, their life and their personality. On each “petseta” there are warp threads that must be fastened. A simple knot would be enough, until some woman, playing with the loose threads, created the first finger lace pattern. This is the main subject of this film. Mrs Marie Naxaki’s encounter with these women led to the joy of talking about the past and the special meaning of the finger lace edging.

As winter turns their tourist village into a ghost town, a young female cat along with a bunch of strays set on an odyssey across a small island, in search of foster humans.

Short by Vassilis Moissidis

In a remote village near the Greek-Albanian borders, an exiled father becomes obsessed with a young woman's murder.

If there weren’t any buses, would there be films? In March 2020, the window of my gaze narrowed down. City life almost ceased. Non-essential movements were prohibited, and cinemas closed. I don’t know what I miss the most, cinema or a non-essential movement.

Aristos, a country boy, works at the Athens meat market and transports lambs from Lamia in his truck. On his journey, he accidentally picks up a fashion house director, Madame Georgette, and her daughter. When they arrive in Athens, Aristos visits the fashion house, where he is offered a job as a model. Madame Georgette, in order to save her business, intends to take the little money he has earned and use it for her younger sister's dowry. Aristos is impressed by the beautiful models, but especially by the director's daughter, Julia. He forgets his old love and the promises of marriage he had made to the sisters of the merchants in order to get credit, and spends his savings on becoming a model.

A film by Eva Stefani

Fotis Georgiadis attempts to combine rap music with opera influences. The making of everybody loves Greek rap wants to see.

According to the director: “The film deals with the corrosive effect, on a relatively advanced life, of what psychologists may call ‘the repressed’, while I prefer to concentrate on the beautiful Greek word ‘kaemos’ [καημός, translated as longing, unfulfilled desire]. The most ‘realistic’ and most synoptic… synopsis I can give for the fiction of the film is: ‘A man comes face to face with himself’, but this wording (and here comes the fantasy element) must be read literally.”

18-year-old Ellie is preparing for a big step in her life, to leave her parents' house to study, but fear holds her back and drowns her. The step for Ellie is taken by her childhood imaginary friend, a fish, reminding her of the reason she must move forward. Ellie hesitates but the next step, the realization of the truth and the acceptance of her adult self, is a one-way street.

The strange suicide of a scientist working in an Oil company permanently changes the lives of two friends, leading them to investigate and uncover the truth.

1942 in Alexandria. The Allies' Middle-East Headquarters commands four Greeks to sabotage a German base on a Greek island of the Aegean in order to cut off Romel's supply chain between Europe and North Africa. Second lieutenant Apostolou and Sergeant Kamenidis make a parachute fall on the island, while Lieutenant Patsis and Sergeant Petropoulos arrive by submarine. They collaborate with members of the local resistance group in their effort to execute their mission, while a great love is born between Patsis and a young freedom fighter.

A film crew travels out to a village in Anatolia to shoot a movie. But after each were affected by a dream they saw, the remaining four team members decide to stay and investigate the incident.

Antonis lives alone in his family's beach house, hiding away from the world. He has given up on life and is literally watching the world pass him by. It has been left up to his best friends - two offbeat cupids - to remind him that there are things to live for.

Two brothers, separated in their youth, grow up to be a singer and an assassin, with the latter being hired to kill the former. Jeetendra, Shatrughan Sinha. Directed by K. Raghavendra Rao.

Members of an otherwise typical New York Brooklyn family are "tortured" by a kind of hereditary madness. In the meantime, the adopted nephew Mortimer tries to do everything to protect his two aunts, who indulge in a variety of dangerous acts, such as poisoning lonely and homeless elderly people, and burying them in the basement of their house. When another niece, Jonathan, arrives, the situation will spiral out of control. The play was released on DVD by Radiotileorasi magazine in December 2010 (78th DVD of the "ERT Cultural Film Archive" series).

The story of four fellow students who fall in love with the same girl.

Escape is the only solution for Aris, who fatally wounds a police officer. His motorcycle covers long distances, but he still comes into conflict with the authorities and is forced to go from village to village because he is wanted. In one village, he meets Eva, a girl who wants to escape the narrow confines of the countryside, and so they leave together. But then they find themselves facing the wild countryside alone and without help, while the police are hunting them. At an inn, three men approach Eva...

Vera is anxious about her first night out with Lola. Lola is trying to be there for Vera but gets easily distracted. While they’re both struggling to connect, their minds will escape to the beginning of the night, where things between them were still intimate.

The first and last myth-making feature film of director and actor Mimis Kougioumtzis tells the story of a young man on the brink of manhood, who finds himself involved in a case of drug dealing - a dangerous adventure for both him and his best friends that will leave a lasting mark on their lives.

Titled Colossi of Love, the documentary highlights the halcyon days of the kamaki (Greek for harpoon) suitors in the 70s and 80s when droves of women from mainly Scandinavia, Germany and Britain flocked to the Greek islands.

Telemachus, an actor with a glorious past and an uncertain future, leaves Athens at the age of fifty to escape the banks. With the help of Babis "Fou," he finds refuge in an abandoned castle in the heart of Messinia. The only inhabitants are two brothers who don't speak to each other and a niece who got fed up with them and left, Demokratia. Telemachus meets her by chance and is enchanted. A little of the doctor's syrup for his lungs, which have become a mine, a little tsipouro, a little of Babis' "forbidden substances"... the gods intervene and Democracy returns to her place! Dream, reality, or both? You be the judge, and whoever finds out wins a Kalamon pasteli.

An evil force is awakened in downtown Athens transforming the unsuspecting citizens into raving zombies. The few survivors will have to fight hard for their lives. To the death.

Captain Michos Floros returns to Samarina to gather more men and lead them to Messolonghi, joining General Makris's existing forces. Thus, with the help of his friend Elias Manakas and 25 other men, they set off on a long journey to meet Zisis Hatzimati and the rest of their compatriots in Messolonghi. On March 31, 1826, they began their difficult journey through the mountains. At the same time, the women in the village tried to learn from Eleni Florou the real reason for their men's sudden departure. Ibrahim Pasha and the Turkish commander of Arta, Nihat Servan, prepare their final attack on Messolonghi.