New Greek Cinema

Greece has become a talking point – with innovations of cinematic nature. A young generation of filmmakers has been counteracting economic misery with immense artistic capital in the form of new aesthetic approaches. Its inventive, unconventional and often disturbing images have provided new impulses for international auteur cinema and caused a stir at major festivals.

Our selection of 13 current Greek features and documentaries from 2009 to 2012 put together by Arsenal, most of which can be seen in Berlin for the first time, presents a cinema of huge aesthetic variety, which clearly sets itself apart from the “New Greek Cinema" of the 70s. It can be seen as a veritable sea change, a shift away from classical formats and conventions that has brought about a revitalization of the Greek film landscape. Contemporary Greek cinema is daring, funny, awkward, crazy, visionary and heterogeneous. It is individual, non-conformist and radically offbeat. It experiments with different artistic forms and defies easy categorization. It looks beyond state funding for means of financing. It is neither the result of a political or economic initiative, nor can one speak of a movement or school, although the filmmakers do form a network of sorts, frequently working together or supporting each other's projects. Produced at a time of political, economic and moral collapse, most of the films do not depict Greece’s social crisis in order to convey some sort of political message, yet nearly all of them recount more or less the same problems: economic crisis, speechlessness, family dysfunction, violent propensities, xenophobia, lethargy and a lack of vision. A skeptical treatment of language, a sense of the grotesque and above all strong criticism of the role and state of the family characterize many current Greek films, as does their extraordinary artistic diversity.

We are particularly glad to be able to welcome the two most prominent representatives of new Greek cinema thanks to the support of the Greek Cultural Foundation Berlin: we are expecting filmmaker Yorgos Lanthimos for both the opening of the series on May 4 with a preview of ALPEIS (before the regular cinema release via Rapid Eye Movies in mid June) as well as for the screening of DOGTOOTH on May 5, while on May 10, Athina Rachel Tsangari will be presenting and discussing her multi-award winning ATTENBERG to coincide with its general release.