The big 2000s leap: digital tools, new classics, and European cinema finally earning ground in the U.S. spotlight.

Normal

Gaspar Noé’s shocking film that divided the audience and was as hated and loved as very few others, is still a provocative and brutal masterpiece on the savagery of human nature and the unfruitfulness of revenge.

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A woman is molested and savagely raped in an underpass. Her lover and her ex will look for the man who did it seeking revenge. A story in an “irreversible” sequence of events, from the end to the beginning.

Irreversible

In his sole cinematic journey outside his country's borders to date, the wonderful Wong Kar-wai discovers his own America, mapping in his unique way beautiful emotional landscapes of loneliness and mood for love.

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After a breakup, a young woman embarks on a solitary journey of search and self-discovery in America, meeting unique and strangely fascinating people who will change her beliefs and character forever.

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Official Selection | Cannes Film Festival | 2007

My Blueberry Nights

Troubled in its time by the distribution circuit, extremely but unexpectedly pop after years, "Soul Kicking" was the film that showed even more than the others that Economides could create his own unique universe, a cinema that would be hard to find its counterpart in Greece.

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Takis is a middle-aged craft worker, divorced, remarried and with a newborn baby. With pressures from everywhere. No one leaves him alone. His wife, his employer, his relatives, his friends. Violence and oppression. Verbal, mental, physical. All against one and God against all. The lit fuse is several yards from the gunpowder. But in the end it reaches it.

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Official Selection - International Competition | Thessaloniki Film Festival | 2006

Soul Kicking

Bergman and Tati find a common language in the former's homeland, thanks to Roy Anderson's inventive film in which the absurdity of everyday life meets the concerns of a society moving forward without a moral compass. One of the masterpieces of the 00s, first part of an informal trilogy.

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At some unspecified time between the 1950s and today, somewhere in the northern hemisphere, things are not going well at all: A magician makes a tragic mistake and saws a man in half, a lost immigrant is beaten up in a busy street, an employee is fired after being humiliated for no apparent reason, and there's a traffic jam.

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Jury Prize | Cannes Film Festival | 2000

Songs from the Second Floor

One of the most significant European films of the 2000s, rightfully earning the prestigious Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival, it propelled the career of the then-young Fatih Akin. Because "you can end your life without committing suicide. By starting a new one.

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Kahit and Sibel, Germans of Turkish descent, enter into a marriage of convenience, allowing young Sibel to escape the strict constraints of her conservative family. The "couple" shares the same apartment but nothing more, as Sibel maintains her independent sexual life. Initially accepting, they soon find themselves consumed by a jealous form of love, leading to extremes.

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Golden Bear | Berlin Film Festival | 2004
FIPRESCI Prize | Berlin Film Festival | 2004
Best European Film | European Film Awards | 2004
Best Director | European Film Awards | 2004

Head-On

In the years when the Dardenne brothers were front-runners for the Palme d'Or whenever they went to Cannes,"Son" was their approach to the psychological drama, with the agonizing development of a relationship between the two, seemingly unknown, main characters. A great and awarded performance by Olivier Gourmet.

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Who is this boy, Francis? And if Olivier refused to accept him as an apprentice in his carpentry shop, why has he started following him through the corridors of the training center, the streets, his home? Why is she so interested in him? Why does he seem so afraid of him?

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Special Prize of the Jury (Special Mention) | Cannes Film Festival | 2002
Best Actor Award (Olivier Gourmet) | Cannes FIlm Festival | 2002

The Son

A riveting game of politics, guilt and well-kept family secrets. Once more Claude Chabrol pokes fun at the bourgeoisie, with a nod to Hitchcock, in this exciting mix of crime mystery and social analysis from the French master of suspense.

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A city council woman in Bordeaux has her eyes set on becoming mayor. Her election campaign is derailed by an anonymous letter accusing her family of being Nazis. Some suspect a far-right group is behind the libel, while others think it’s the woman’s philanderer husband who is outraged at his wife’s political ambitions. In the two weeks leading up to the election, secrets will come to light, and the innocents will plead guilty.

The Flower of Evil

James Gray freely adapts Dostoyevsky's White Nights to take place on the streets of New York and creates a complex and sensitive romantic drama, which was in the Official Competition at Cannes 2008 and is lead by Joaquin Phoenix's sensational performance.

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A man returns to his childhood home in Brooklyn after a suicide attempt. As he recovers, a mysterious and beautiful neighbour with various problems and a tender girl, daughter of the man who will buy the family business, put him in deep emotional dilemmas about how he feels, what he wants and what he should do.

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Official Selection | Cannes Film Festival | 2008

Two Lovers

It was meant to be the cinematic event of the 60s. Instead, three weeks into filming, the project gets abandoned, leaving behind an unfinished masterpiece. Completed in 2009 as a mix of fiction and documentary, this “Inferno” is a film jewel and a glance to a parallel world of beauty.

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In 1964, Henri-Georges Clouzot picks Romy Schneider and Serge Reggiani to star in “Inferno”. The enigmatic project would focus on a hotel manager possessed by the demons of jealousy, and was meant to be the biggest cinematic event of the decade, with Clouzot being given carte blanche and a large budget. However, during filming everything goes wrong, the project gets abandoned, and something that was meant to make history is left unfinished.

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Best Documentary Award | César Awards | 2010
International Jury Award for Best Documentary | Sao Paolo International Film Festival | 2009

Henri-Georges Clouzot's Inferno

Claude Chabrol meets the heights of his ‘60s filmography with this suspenseful gem full of playfulness and lethal passion. Isabelle Huppert in one of her 7 collaborations with the director and Anna Mouglalis in one of her first on-screen appearances.

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A famous pianist and the CEO of a chocolate factory get married, the second time for both of them. The pianist has a teenage son from his previous marriage, whose mother died at birth. A young pianist enters their lives claiming to be his real daughter. That’s when the new wife’s Machiavellian character comes to play…

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Best Film | Louis Delluc Prize | 2000

Nightcap

Roy Anderson's fourth film brings his tableaux vivants back to the screen, addressing the human being, his greatness and his baseness, his joy and his sorrow, his confidence and his anxiety. A tragic comedy or is it a comic tragedy about ourselves?

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In the Swedish city named Oblivion, people from different walks of life participate in a series of short vignettes that hurry past us. Some last only seconds, no more than a few minutes. A young woman recalls an imaginary honeymoon with a rock guitarist. A man wakes up from a dream. A businessman brags about success while being robbed by a pickpocket. The absurd collection is accompanied by jazz music.

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Official Selection - Un Certain Regard | Cannes Film Festival | 2007

You, the Living

Can a film about education move you to tears? Of course it can, as is evidenced in this award-winning documentary about a school year, that was beloved by audiences in France and is sure to speak to the hearts of all. The young students in the class steal the show.

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In rural France, schoolteacher Georges Lopez educates 12 children, whose ages range from 4 to 11 years old. Over the course of a year, the soon-to-retire Lopez instructs them all in one small classroom with the traditional tools of French teaching: rote repetition and the dictation of literary passages for copying. As the seasons pass, Lopez must keep his students disciplined while preparing the older children for the exams that will determine their educational future.

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Best Editing | César Awards | 2003
Nominated for Best Film not in the English Language | BAFTA Awards | 2004
Best Documentary Award | Valladolid International Film Festival | 2002

To Be and to Have

Αward-winning and globally beloved, bearing the stamp of an instant classic, Thomas Alfredson's masterpiece holds a prominent position among the most original and tender interpretations of the vampire myth.

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Oscar, a neglected boy, finds love and redemption through Eli, a beautiful yet peculiar girl.

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Jury Prize | Tribeca Film Festival | 2008
Nomination for Best Foreign Language Film | BAFTA | 2010

Let the Right One In

The tropes of rom-coms, coming-of-age movies and buddy comedies are passed through the lens of a sports story in one of the most entertaining comedies of the '00s, the era when Beckham was at his peak. A huge hit that became a benchmark, it introduced us to the then up-and-coming Keira Knightley.

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Jess, the daughter of a strict Indian couple in London, is not allowed to play organised football, even though she is 18 years old. When she plays for fun one day, her impressive skills do not go unnoticed by Jules, who persuades Jess to play for her semi-professional team. She begins to use elaborate excuses to hide her matches from her family while dealing with her romantic feelings for her coach, Joe.

Bend it Like Beckham

Stavros Psyllakis’s unforgettable documentary was the first ever documentary to be honored by the Greek Film Academy. It draws inspiration from a sad story, a remnant of the civil war, that turns it into a monument of benevolence through its heroes' memories.

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In Crete, part of the Democratic army survived even after the Civil War had ended. These outlaw radicals, hid for about 14 years near Chania, trying to regroup the illegal organizations. In 1962, six of them escaped through Italy to Tashkent. The three that survived compose the main characters of the documentary. This story’s equally vibrant and ellusive "protagonists" and "unsung", beyond ideologies, embody something extremely important: a deep devotion to humans and their dignity.

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Best Documentary | Hellenic Film Academy Awards | 2010
Best Film | Halkida Greek Documentary Festival | 2009
Audience Award | Nicosia Documentary Festival | 2009

There was No Other Way

Who is scamming the scammers? With his trademark humour and constant lack of faith in people, Woody Allen crafts an impeccable mystery comedy and - at the same time - a sharp class satire.

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A small-time crook plans to rob a bank, but in the meantime he becomes rich thanks to his wife's cookies! The latter, overcome by the madness of grandeur, asks an art dealer to introduce her to the ways of high society, not suspecting that he is a big-time crook.

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Nomination for Best Actress in a Leading Role (Tracey Ullman) | Golden Globes | 2001

Small Time Crooks

Two years after the over-ambitious Fountain, Darren Aronofsky took everyone by surprise with an anthropocentric look at the world of the fallen, while Mickey Rourke delivered a great performance that put him back on the cinematic map. Golden Lion in Venice and two Oscar nominations.

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Randy Robinson, a veteran professional wrestler, was at the height of his career in the 1980s, but twenty-five years later, he is trapped in the life that followed and is now doing one thing only, fighting to survive. When things change and while realizing the dark and underground way in which the ring operates, Randy will overcome the limits he set for himself and attempt to change his life.

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Golden Lion | Venice Film Festival | 2008
Nomination for Best Leading Actor (Mickey Rourke) | Oscars | 2009
Nomination for Best Supporting Actress (Marisa Tomei) | Oscars | 2009
Best Actor (MIckey Rourke) | BAFTA Awards | 2009
Best Actor (MIckey Rourke) | Golden Globes | 2009

﻿The Wrestler

Loosely inspired by Mike Leigh’s childhood environment, this is one of the greatest titles in the director’s filmography, awarded with the Golden Lion in Venice Film Festival, nominated for 3 Oscars, and with an unforgettable Imelda Staunton in the leading role.

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In 1950s England, 45 year old Vera Drake, a simple and goodhearted woman that works as a cleaner, conceals from her family that she performs illegal abortions, something she considers the humane thing to do for the unfortunate girls, and for which she’s not getting paid. But when one of her patients has post-surgery complications, Vera’s work will be revealed and she will face the law, society and her family.

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Golden Lion | Venice FIlm Festival | 2004
Best Actress (Imelda Staunton) | Venice FIlm Festival | 2004
Best Actress (Imelda Staunton) | BAFTA Awards | 2005
Best Director | BAFTA Awards | 2005
Nomination for Best Leading Actress Best Director and Best Original Screenplay | Oscars | 2005

Vera Drake

With executive producer Martin Scorsese and a screenplay by writer Ioanna Karystiani, this is perhaps the most ambitious film of Pantelis Voulgaris' filmography, a grandiose and heartbreaking love story that is crushed by the weight of history.

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The journey of 700 women of Greek, Turkish and Russian origin from Istanbul to New York in 1922, where they meet the men they are to marry, and the love on board between one of these women and an American photographer.

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Best Film | Thessaloniki Film Festival | 2004
Best Actress (Victoria Haralabidou) | Thessaloniki Film Festival |2004

Brides

A quest that leads to the unravelling οf secrets and revelations in a political and personal odyssey directed by Fatih Akin in one of the most powerful films of his career. A social tragedy in three acts that won the Lux Prize and two awards at Cannes.

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Nejat does not approve of his widowed father, Ali’s decision to move in with his prostitute girlfriend, Yeter. He starts to warm up to her, however, when he discovers she sends money home to Turkey to help put her daughter through school. Yeter’s sudden death drives father and son apart. Nejat travels to Istanbul to look for Yeter’s daughter, Ayten. Political activist Ayten, however, is already in Germany to escape the Turkish police.

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Best Screenplay | Cannes Film Festival | 2007
Prize of the Ecumenical Jury | Cannes Film Festival | 2007
LUX Prize | European Audience Awards | 2007
Nominated for Best Foreign Film | César Awards | 2008

The Edge of Heaven

In one of the most classic films of the world cinema of the '00s, a glance at organized crime against the background of Rio’s favelas turns into an epic of conflicts of jaw-dropping beauty. Nominated for 4 Oscars, including the Award for Best Director for Fernando Meirelles.

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In the poor favelas of Rio de Janeiro in the 1970s, two young men choose different paths. Rocket is a budding photographer documenting the increasing drug-related violence in his neighborhood. Zé is an ambitious drug dealer who uses Rocket and his photos as a way to increase his reputation as a war breaks out with his rival. The conflict will be sweeping.

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Nomination for Best Director Oscar | Oscars | 2004
Nomination for Best Original Screenplay Oscar | Oscars | 2004
Best Editing | BAFTA Awards | 2003
Nomination for Best Foreign Language Film | Golden Globes | 2003
Visions Award - Special Mention | Toronto Film Festival | 2002

City of God

Before "Zodiac", there was Bong Joon-ho's "Memories of Murder". The 4 Oscar winning director of "Parasites" captures the true story of Korea's first serial killer murders, as two detectives follow the murderer's trail. One of the top Korean movies of all time.

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In 1986, two unsuspecting detectives take on the case of a double murder in a South Korean province. But when the killer strikes several times again, detectives realize they're on the hunt for the country's first recorded serial killer. Based only on their instinct and skills, the two detectives attempt to solve the puzzle by combining the evidence at their disposal, in a thriller based on true events. Oscar winner Bong Joon-Ho's first collaboration with the star of "Parasites", Song Kang-ho.

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Best Director | San Sebastián International Film Festival | 2003
Best New Director | San Sebastián International Film Festival | 2003

Memories of Murder

Where reason ends, the cinema of David Lynch begins. As dreamy, nightmarish and “lynch” as ever, the great American director delivers a 3-hour magnum opus-riddle, where everything that makes his work unique, thrives.

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A Hollywood star is set to star in the remake of a 'cursed' Polish film. As she immerses herself in the role, beginning to adopt the persona of her character, her world turns into a surreal nightmare.

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Future Film Festival Digital Award | Venice Film Festival | 2006

INLAND EMPIRE

The first film directed by Greta Gerwig, back in 2008. In probably the most famous film of the mumblecore movement at the time, alongside genre pioneer Joe Swanberg, she finds her future footing in a must-see cinematic diamond in the rough.

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A couple maintains their relationship despite the distance that separates them, but the problems are not lacking and are constantly growing. Without explaining how or why, we watch the decline of a relationship which can happen to anyone.

Nights and Weekends

The film that introduced Diao Yi'nan (Black Coal, Thin Ice) as one of the most compelling young Chinese directors, is an atmospheric and dark story of a doomed love in the faceless and chaotic modern-day China.

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In a prison for criminals condemned to death, a lonely and widowed correctional officer often travels with the night train to a neighboring town to meet men through a dating service. After many unsuccessful attempts, she will feel attracted to a mysterious man, without knowing that he is hiding a secret.

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Official Selection - Un Certain Regard | Cannes Film Festival | 2007