Sunday, October 30, 20227:00 PM (Pacific Time)
The Suspended Step of the Stork
To Meteoro Vima tou Pelargou, Greece, 1991
The plight of refugees in the Balkans and internationally dominated much of Theo Angelopoulos’ attention in the 1990s, leading to two of his most acclaimed films,
Ulysses' Gaze (1995) and
Eternity and a Day (1998).
The Suspended Step of the Stork, which inaugurates this “Trilogy of Borders,” however, may be his sharpest assault on the moral and political failures of the West leading to the crisis. When a TV journalist believes he’s found a missing Greek politician living in a refugee camp, a routine story becomes a potential blockbuster. A world-weary Marcello Mastroianni plays the mysterious refugee with Jeanne Moreau as the politician’s embittered wife who may hold the key to his identity.
35mm, color, in Greek with English subtitles, 136 min. Director: Theo Angelopoulos. Screenwriter: Theodoros Angelopoulos, Tonino Guerra, Petros Markaris, Dimitris Nollas, Thanassis Valtinos. With: Marcello Mastroianni, Jeanne Moreau, Gregory Patrikareas.
The Beekeeper
O Melissokomos, Greece, 1986
Every year, Spyros (Marcello Mastroianni) takes up the family tradition of transporting its colony of bees across the rugged northern Greek countryside. This season, however, he’s joined by a young woman (Nadia Mourouzi) he picks up hitchhiking. Mastroianni delivers a quiet, reserved performance that confounded some critics who felt Theo Angelopoulos had miscast the international star. But Mastroianni’s soulful silence, however, draws us deep into the existential crisis at the heart of the film about a generation that felt consumed by history and another in the process of forgetting it.
35mm, color, in Greek with English subtitles, 122 min. Director: Theo Angelopoulos. Screenwriter: Theo Angelopoulos, Tonino Guerra, Dimitris Nollas. With: Marcello Mastroianni, Nadia Mourouzi, Jenny Roussea.
Landscapes of Time
This event is a part of
Landscapes of Time: The Films of Theo Angelopoulos, a series of screenings that includes all of Angelopoulos' feature films and a selection of shorts. The program is presented by the
UCLA Film & Television Archive and the
UCLA Stavros Niarchos Foundation Center for the Study of Hellenic Culture with the collaboration of the
UCLA Center for European and Russian Studies, and under the auspices of the
Consulate General of Greece in Los Angeles. Special thanks to our community partners
Los Angeles Greek Film Festival, and
South East European Film Festival Los Angeles. See the schedule for the series as a whole
here.
Venue
Billy Wilder Theater at the Hammer Museum
10899 Wilshire Boulevard
Los Angeles, CA 90024
Sponsor(s): Center for European and Russian Studies, Film and Television Archive, UCLA Stavros Niarchos Foundation Center for the Study of Hellenic Culture, Consulate General of Greece in Los Angeles, Los Angeles Greek Film Festival, Stavros Niarchos Foundation, South East European Film Festival Los Angeles