At the opening gala of the 8th Greek Film Festival in Berlin, a warm welcome was given to the participants who were present and, not least, the audience. The venue was Berlin’s excellently preserved and centrally located Babylon Mitte main cinema hall. Along with its two smaller screens, it would play host to the five-day event of two competitions, shorts, special screenings, and a spotlight on actor Vangelis Mourikis. The opening ceremony’s introductions were followed by a live music saxophone performance from Alekos Gramma, just prior to the opening film, Where We Live, directed by Sotiris Goritsas.

Drawing allusions to a tragi-comedy, Where We Live follows just another typically hectic day in the life of a young lawyer. Although this day is also his birthday, he still has the same list of obligations to tick off. These include his employee, son, lover, and friend; and each day represents something akin to déjà vu with recurring tasks in a never ending circle of his life. Although he can look to blame his parents’ generation for this, the immediate concern is how he will survive from day to day. A high octane film with all the flux of the modern day urban jungle ensures that Where We Live a guide on how to keep breathing.

One of the successes of the program this year was that the majority of the directors were present for audience Q&As. At the screening of the excellent documentary Lights Out, Berlin by Dimitris Argyriou, many of the subjects were in the audience and formally introduced by the director afterwards for an interactive discussion. Lights Out, Berlin details the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic on Berlin’s internationally renowned music and club scene in 2020. A collective talking heads viewpoint of the tension and uncertainty that this new world situation had created is conveyed very poignantly.

In Travelling Ghosts, by Thanos Anastopoulos, the history of the isolated Italian coastal port of Trieste is appropriately represented in this docu-fiction that merges historic and fictional characters. During the reconstruction of the Greek cemetery, ghosts of the past leave the cemetery and wander the city to visit places, characters and unresolved events. Parallel to this, a filmmaker wants to make a documentary about the liberation movements of pre-revolutionary Greece. This compelling work portrays the legacy of European movements to resounding effect.

The Documentary Competition entry, Femicidio by Nina Maria Paschalidou is a haunting portrayal of the dark side of human nature. In Italy in 2022 alone, 105 women were killed by men who were once their partners. In April 2014, Laura Roveri, a 28-year-old yoga teacher from Verona, was stabbed 16 times by her former boyfriend at a town discotheque. The documentary portrays her brave fight to live on through the physical and mental scars, confronting the shocking past event whilst looking to the future. Through interactions with women’s organizations and activists, the film explores the problems of Italian society and helps us to understand the mentality of the women who become victims, as well as the importance of prevention.

Meanwhile, in the Emerging Greeks Competition, the premise of Black Stone, by first-time director Spiros Jacovidis, concerns a documentary crew filming absent civil servants who stumble upon Haroula, a desperate, overprotective Greek mother in search of her son. When he is accused of fraud, Haroula sets out with her other, disabled son and a Greek-African taxi driver to return him home. The traditions of a holy Greek family and institutional prejudices of Greek society is extrapolated and brought to the surface in an allegorical but also humorous film.

Taking family matters to a less humorous level, Listen by Maria Douza concerns a 16-year-old deaf girl who, due to her father’s financial upheavals, is forced to leave her progressive school in Athens and return to his island home. There, she suffers from re-entry shock when confronted with prejudice and intolerance from her peers and sibling, along with low self-esteem. Listen is a sympathetic coming-of-age drama that gets under the skin of family life, turmoil and trauma, but with hearty compassion.

Dignity by Dimitris Katsimiris takes place on the occasion of an elderly, ailing father’s birthday, where the uncomfortable reunion of three siblings gradually leads to an intense, explosive and ruthless confrontation. This will inexorably change the sibling dynamics in a film that touches a nerve of Greek family life, something that is endemic in much of the world. A lighter and more surreal affair was Magnetic Fields by debut director Yorgos Gousis. Following a chance meeting en route to an island, a woman and a man wander around together in search of a good place to bury a metallic box. Progressively hypnotic with dry humor, this road movie with a difference was also Greece’s official entry for the 2022 Foreign Language Oscar.

Away from the screenings, there was an industry presentation event hosted by Crew United Greece. Under the banner “Show me the Crew!” and with innovative tools to enable the networking of industry professionals, Crew United has now expanded to include Greece and is launching this spring. During the Award Ceremony of the Greek Film Festival’s 8th edition, Crew United awarded a five-year Premium video and membership subscription on their platform this year to the winners of the Emerging Greeks Competition section and the Documentary section.

At the Award Ceremony, the winner of Emerging Greeks Award was Black Stone by Spiros Jacovidis, accompanied by 1000 euros, sponsored by the Greek Film Centre (EKK) in Athens. The winner of the Documentary Award was Femicidio by Nina Maria Paschalidou, accompanied by 500 euros, sponsored by the Musou Music Group. Both films also received the promised five-year Premium video and membership subscription from Crew United.

The closing screening was Dodo by Panos Koutras. In a luxurious villa near Athens, a couple is on the brink of financial ruin. On the eve of the long-awaited wedding of their daughter to a wealthy heir, a dodo, a bird that became extinct 300 years ago, suddenly appears and creates mayhem all around. This hilarious black comedy had its World Premiere at the 75th Cannes Film Festival and was a perfect fun way to end this festival edition.