Feel like fleeing the country? You are not alone. Vicarious flight, at least, can be pretty easily managed with the return this weekend of the San Francisco Greek Film Festival. Its 22nd edition takes place both in-person at the Delaney Screening Room Sat/15 through Sat/22, and via online access March 15-April 5. The eight live programs (nearly all starting at 7 pm, save opening/closing nights at 6) each include a feature and one or two shorts.
The kickoff attraction is US comedy Greek Mothers Never Die, whose heroine Ella (Abby Miner) has been strangled by mom Despina’s (writer-director Rachel Suissa) “overbearing love” from the cradle. When ma kicks the bucket, that ought to be the end of it—yet her ghost proves just as meddlesome in her daughter’s affairs. In a similar vein, Vasilis Christopfilakis wrote, directed, and stars in Guest Star (Thurs/20) as a nebbishy recluse overshadowed by his glam movie-star parents even years after their deaths. He’s offered an improbable chance at hosting a late-night TV show. But that requires a considerable image makeover—including, for publicity’s sake, a pretend “romance” with a pop star (Elli Tringou) whose own psychological issues make his look like child’s play.
The bulk of this year’s main Greek Fest selections are more serious in tenor. Yorgos Zois’ Arcadia (Sun/16) is a somber drama about a couple called to a remote region to identify a body, only to find themselves caught in a larger sort of metaphysical limbo between the living and the dead. Jason Raftopoulos’ Voices in Deep (Mon/17) involves characters in very up-to-the-moment crises involving refugees, economic hardship and illegal trades. Sofia Exarchou’s Animal (Tues/18) stars Dimitra Vlagopoulou as a worker at an island resort where she and others are expected to present an image of hedonistic abandon for foreign tourists. But the rave-like atmosphere conceals a depressing reality for employees who are not remotely “on vacation.” Likewise, “paradise” isn’t all it’s supposed to be for the young heroine spending a summer on the Athenian Riviera in Orfeas Peretzis’ film (Wed/19).
Grimmer still is Dimitris Nakos’ Meat (Fri/21), which recalls ancient Greek tragedies in its tale of violence and vengeance within a family operating a rural butcher shop. There’s also considerable suspense in the intrigue of Penny Panayotopoulou’s feature Wishbone (Sat/22), where a young man forced to take on the burden of his family’s welfare after a brother’s death takes a job as security guard at a hospital. But there is dangerous criminality there, too, and he risks losing everything by becoming involved in its not-so-easy money.
All the above are narrative titles, and will also be available for streaming. Available online-only are a number of documentary features and shorts, including portraits of celebrated composer Yani Spanos (A Life Behind the Marquee) and Anthea Sylbert (My Life in 3 Days), the latter an Oscar-nominated producer and costume designer whose credits included Rosemary’s Baby, Carnal Knowledge, Chinatown and Shampoo. There are also nonfiction flicks about cave diving (4Caves—4Seasons), a massive emigration of Greek laborers to Germany in the early 1960s (A Couple of Years), the case of three Afghan women murdered in Greece (Evros: A Blurred landscape), the historic mountain village of Kalarrites (Bimsa), and more.
The official closing-night screening of Wishbone will be preceded by presentation of the Spyros P. Skouras Lifetime Achievement Award to longtime studio executive and producer Sid Ganis. His career at Lucasfilm, Paramount, Marvel Entertainment and elsewhere has encompassed involvement with The Empire Strikes Back, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Top Gun, Fatal Attraction, Forrest Gump, Iron Man, and even an Adam Sandler vehicle or two. For full info on the 22nd SF Greek Film Festival, running March 15-22 (and until April 5 online), go here.