Greek cinema

Angelopoulos films a travelling theatre company crossing twenty years of Greek history, from the Metaxas dictatorship to the aftermath of civil war, in takes so long that a single shot changes period. This cinema makes slowness a political instrument, in a country emerging from civil war and then under the dictatorship of the colonels. Cacoyannis took the opposite path with a Kazantzakis novel and a dance that went round the world, Koundouros filmed an accountant mistaken for a gangster, Papatakis shot a news item about murderous maids.

works 5

• Feature filmThe Ogre of AthensΟ ΔράκοςNikos Koundouros · 1956Film noir of 1956 about an ordinary employee who takes on the identity of a gangster among the underworld of Athens cabarets.Cinema
• Feature filmLes AbyssesNikos Papatakis · 1963A 1963 French film drawn from a news story of the thirties, in which two unpaid maidservants stand up to their ruined employers.Cinema
• Feature filmZorba the GreekΑλέξης ΖορμπάςMichael Cacoyannis · 1964A 1964 adaptation, shot in black and white in rural Crete, of a Greek novel about the meeting of an intellectual and a man of the land.Cinema
• Feature filmAnna's EngagementΤο προξενιό της ΆνναςPantelis Voulgaris · 1972A Greek film of 1972 about a servant who is promised a marriage, and above all about the family that promises it to her.Cinema
• Feature filmThe Travelling PlayersΟ θίασοςTheo Angelopoulos · 1975A 1975 fresco that spans thirteen years of Greek history through the eyes of a travelling theatre troupe.Cinema