Athens Open Air Film Festival
Electra (1962)
The 8th Athens Open Air Film Festival collaborates with Athens & Epidaurus Festival
Electra waits for the right opportunity to take revenge for the murder of her father, Agamemnon, murdered by his wife, Clytemnestra and her lover, Aegisthus. The time seems ripe when Electra is reunited with her brother, Orestes. The siblings plot a murderous plan.
In 1962, Michael Cacoyannis delivers the most timeless and exemplary cinematic adaptation of Green tragedy. Disregarding previous film adaptations of the myth of Atreides that were based on Aeschylus' (The Libation Bearers) and Sophocles' (Electra) tragedies, Cacoyannis' film draws on Euripides' play, the most modern among the ancient tragic writers. In concert with Euripides' spirit, Cacoyannis sets the plot outside the palace. Electra is a story about humans, those who do not allow themselves to be led by fatalism; those who live in the fringes of society and act of their own volition.
Irene Pappas, with her strikingly Greek face, transforms a boyish, tattered princess into a vindictive creature of raw, animalistic energy. Mikis Theodorakis' music score echoes the desperate cries of the title character. Eugène Ionesco praised the film in an article in Le Figaro as the best film he's ever seen. Electra received the award for Best Film Adaptation at the Cannes Festival, as well as 24 international awards and accolades, including a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. A film that is not merely the film version of a stage work; tragedy is transformed into catharsis, cinema-style.
Free admission
With the support of Michael Cacoyannis Foundation
Duration 110'
Little Theatre of Ancient Epidaurus
- 30/06/2018 at 21:30
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Ancient Theatre of Epidaurus | Little Theatre of Ancient Epidaurus | Peiraios 260 | Odeon of Herodes Atticus | Sotiria Hospital | «THEATRON» | Cultural Center «Hellenic Cosmos» | Icthyoskala Keratsiniou | Sychrono Theatro | National Library of Greece | Athens Conservatoire | Pallas Theatre | Hellenic Cosmos Cultural Centre Pireos 254 Tavros
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