The funding sources of Greek cinema in the 1970s and 1980s

Disclaimer

The article below was originally written as an undergraduate assignment for the Greek Open University in 2008, during a period when the author’s academic skills were still developing. Although the quality of this article does not match that of later examples of the same author’s work, it is written in a thorough manner and contains useful information for students and other readers with non-specialised knowledge; therefore, it has been proudly included on this website.

The reader needs to be warned that the original assignment, on which this article was based, was written in Greek and was intended to be read by specialised academics. Despite the author’s best intentions to present his essay in the clearest way possible, some points and arguments might still be lost in translation. The author recommends that readers consult the web for additional information on any unfamiliar words or specialised vocabulary.

The author admits that the bibliography for this article is limited, as required for an undergraduate assignment of this level. The author did not include any additional bibliography during the translation of his work into English due to time and access limitations. It must also be noted that the original bibliography for this article was studied from translated copies in Greek; therefore, the page numbers suggested in the citations below match the page numbers of the translated copies and not the original volumes.

Introduction

This article discusses the changes in the funding sources of Greek cinema during the 1970s and 1980s. The paper is divided into three sections. The first section discusses the reasons for changes in funding Greek film productions in the above decades, as well as the effects of these funding strategies on new themes and aesthetics in Greek cinema. The second section presents a case study associated with the new funding conditions of the 1980s: the film The Price of Love (1983) by Tonia Marketaki. The discussion relates to the film’s theme and aesthetics in comparison with the mainstream norms of the 1980s. The third and final section summarises the paper’s key points and offers conclusions on state funding.
As this paper was originally written in 2008, it should be noted that the author’s views on the subject have changed over the years. To provide an updated approach, the paper includes a section of personal remarks, which the author considers important to frame his text from a 21st-century perspective. Although the original paper examined a topic that still attracted attention in the early 2000s, the author currently believes that any discussion of film productions in the 1980s is of limited academic interest. Films from this specific period, particularly those belonging to the political thematology of the New Greek Cinema (NGC), are of limited appeal, as they offer nothing useful to modern audiences. The reasons for this statement are thoroughly explained in the personal remarks section.

Changes in the funding of Greek cinema

The 1970s were a period of economic austerity, during which the economic activities of Greek film production and distribution companies shrank. This crisis in Greek cinema is further pushed by the rising popularity of television. In Greece, television first appeared in the late 1960s. Within a few years, it becomes popular to the widest audience, causing a steep fall in cinema ticket sales. At the same time, the Greek consumers are gradually turning their backs on cinema theatres due to certain changes in social behaviour. This shift probably indicates that the Greek audience of the 1970s was unable to appreciate cinema as a means of expression; its prior contact with cinema was most likely casual and habitual. The decline in ticket sales forces the investors in film productions to withdraw from funding new films. Instead, they fund television series, which are likely to produce quicker profits. The Greek distribution network also adapts to the new fashion: it almost exclusively promotes imported American films, which are highly popular and sell more tickets. This results in a loss of domestic cultural identity, which was previously promoted by the Greek film industry of the 1950s and 1960s (Sotiropoulou 2005, 91-6).

During the 1970s, economic austerity in other European countries was addressed through state funding to support national film production. The Greek government is not prepared to address the new demands; therefore, there is no state funding for domestic film productions. Furthermore, there is unfair treatment of Greek film companies, which are not offered the same tax exemptions and special tax benefits as foreign film companies working in Greece. This official negligence towards domestic cinema forces Greek directors to turn to independent productions funded by private sources. Independent productions are either funded by the directors’ own resources or by private donations from sponsors interested in films. Such independent sponsorships disengage Greek cinema from commerciality and other market-related demands, leading to the production of quality-based films that are not aimed at profit-making. The director-producer phenomenon contributes to the disengagement of artistic expression from previously established commercial constraints. Furthermore, film directors become more flexible in relation to the themes they wish to discuss and the language of filming they wish to employ (Sotiropoulou 2005, 92-4).

In 1970, the Greek Bank of Industrial Development founded the Anonymous Industrial Company for General Cinematography Enterprises, which initially funded some film productions that introduced no artistic innovations. In 1975, the above company became a state funding body under the name National Centre of Cinematography (Εθνικό Κέντρο Κινηματογράφου). Between 1975 and 1980, the NCC funded seventeen films, some of which are characterised by innovative artistic expression. Some of these films are Eleftherios Venizelos (Ελευθέριος Βενιζέλος) by Pantelis Voulgaris (1979), Iphigenia (Ιφιγένεια) by Michael Cacoyiannis (1979), Alexander the Great (Μεγαλέξανδρος) by Theodoros Aggelopoulos (1980) and Parangelia (Παραγγελιά) by Paulos Tasios (1980) (Sotiropoulou 2005, 94-5).

During the 1980s, the NCC became the main funding source for Greek film productions, offering substantial sums of money for the economic standards of the time. Furthermore, the NCC becomes the only available option for many Greek directors, who see their films as cultural products instead of a means of profiteering. The funding of cultural films in the 1980s was a big problem for all directors. Film companies avoid such films because they combine two negative factors: high production costs and low capital depreciation. The NCC's support for independent directors is also supported by its committee members, who are former professionals in the Greek film industry and understand the necessity of innovation and artistic expression promoted by the New Greek Cinema (NGC) movement of that period (ΝΕΚ = Νέος Ελληνικός Κινηματογράφος). In 1986, the Ministry of Culture offered the NCC an unprecedented donation of 328 million drachmas (1). Still, such sums of money are not even close to those offered by other European state-funded bodies; therefore, Greek funding is not enough to support the long-term, continuous production of Greek culture-based films (Sotiropoulou 2005, 140-1).

It needs to be clarified that the changes in the funding conditions of Greek cinema in the 1970s and 1980s do not only affect the New Greek Cinema (NGC) but also the Old Greek Cinema (ΠΕΚ = Παλαιός Ελληνικός Κινηματογράφος); due to its commercial orientation, however, it is easier for certain directors of the OGC to access private funds. Such funding comes primarily from private donors, banks, domestic film companies, and, between 1970 and 1975, from the Anonymous Industrial Company for General Cinematography Enterprises. Unlike the OGC, the NGC relies mostly on private donations, while government funding comes much later. Apart from the NCC funds, government funding also comes from state television and its three networks, which collaborate with the NCC. Towards the end of the 20th century, there appeared funds from the European Union, which are to support Greek productions of cultural (non-commercial) films (Kolovos 2002, 133-4) (2).

Independent productions allow directors to maintain their own aesthetic standards without producer intervention. This way, directors can express their own filming language and employ their own means of expression, symbolism, and ideological statements. The aesthetics of the NGC are characterised by such a multiplicity that no specific sub-movements or cinema schools can be identified or named accordingly. In general, the NGC is characterised by the rejection of three previously established rules: 1) the story following a specific script, 2) the film’s presentation by conventional techniques, and 3) the film’s dependence on the actors’ popularity (necessity of a star system). The NCG aesthetic movement, which tends towards modernity, is represented by directors such as Theodoros Aggelopoulos, Alexis Damianos, Stavros Tornes and many others. Of course, there are also directors who fall outside the NGC, such as Pantelis Voulgaris (although Happy Day is one of his films that falls under the NGC), Tony Lykouresis, Tasos Psarras, Tonia Marketaki, and others (Kolovos 2002, 160-2).

A basic feature of the NGC's aesthetics is its distinct approach to Hellenicity, which is part of the director’s own ideology. It is promoted as a counterbalance to Western culture and Western cultural invasion, as noted in the 1970s. This approach has certain similarities with the ‘30s Generation movement in Greek literature. In relation to filming language, the NGC is dominated by the directors’ inspirations, which are controlled by their own motives and other ambitions. The so-called Director’s Theorem, which re-evaluates European cinema during the 1950s and 1960s, becomes the main expression point of the NGC, granting the director complete power. The main representative of this filming language in Greece is Theodoros Aggelopoulos. In his films, there appear influences from Classical cinema mixed with significant innovations, such as the discontinuity of the narration timeline, the incorporation of the external environment in the film’s plot, the concept of ‘dead time’, the use of sequence shots (plans de séquence), irregular camera movements and long distance shots, which introduce a theatrical set arrangement (Kolovos 2002, 171-82).

Another issue that needs to be stressed in relation to the impact of independent funding on NGC is its detachment from traditional ideologies and the promotion of radical views, often competitive and critical to state practices (3). In NGC, cinema becomes the carrier of a new ideology that begins with the rejection of its own production and distribution networks. This specific network was previously used by the OGC, which was aligned with systemic ideology. In that sense, the NGC promotes a revolutionary attitude that reexamines the relationship between film creation and production. It promotes a new popular demand for an expressionistic, highly artistic Greek cinema with social and humanitarian implications (Kolovos 2002, 185-90).

The NGC suggests that the OGC once supported the ideology of the rich and powerful social strata, which also funded it. The OGC films promoted a consolatory view of modern Greek reality, showing no intention to criticise certain political decisions and remaining silent on important social problems. Instead, it used entertainment to reconcile the existing social gap by telling stories of happy weddings, happy love affairs, and other comical situations. By rejecting the existing production system, the NGC denounces the above relationship and communicates this rejection to its audience. It is a fighting form of cinema, which does not hesitate to accuse the political system itself, particularly the mechanisms established by Colonel’s Dictatorship, and to express the until-then ‘forbidden’ ideological quests of the Greek Left (Kolovos 2002, 185-90) (4).

The new approach followed by the NGC in its aesthetic and ideological quests unfolds through a conscious selection of new themes. The film focuses on the daily problems of modern Greeks and their existential dead ends, stemming from the social and political conditions following the Greek Civil War (1944-1949). The NGC’s favourite topics are internal and external population migration, which is accompanied by other social problems, such as uncontrolled urban growth and involuntary displacement. Some representative films with such thematology are The Cornerstone (Μέχρι το Πλοίο) by Alexis Damianos (1966), Reconstruction (Αναπαράσταση) by Theodoros Angelopoulos (1970), and Voyage to Kythera (Ταξίδι στα Κύθηρα) by Pantelis Voulgaris (1984). Other films target social, political, and other class-related struggles, such as The Travelling Players (Ο Θίασος) by Theodoros Angelopoulos (1975), Happy Day (Χάππυ Νταίη) by Pantelis Voulgaris (1976), and Stone Years (Πέτρινα Χρόνια) by Pantelis Voulgaris (1985). The NGC also examines certain new topics, such as the phenomenon of social inclusion, e.g. in the film The Matchmaking of Anna (Το Προξενιό της Άννας) by Pantelis Voulgaris (1972); love affairs at the society’s margins, e.g. in the film Evdokia (Ευδοκία) by Alexis Damianos (1971); the repression produced by the political system, e.g. in the film Kierion (Κιέριον) by Demos Theos (1968); and finally the repression produced by society’s traditional moral values, e.g. in the film Chrysomallousa (Χρυσομαλλούσα) by Tony Lykouresis (1978) (Kolovos 2002, 166-8). During the 1980s, the NGC included political comedies, such as the film My Son, Educate! (Μάθε Παιδί μου Γράμματα) by Theodoros Maragos (1981). There appear to be films about the existential anxieties of modern people and the lack of social contact in large urban centres, such as Revanche (Ρεβάνς) by Nikos Georgitsis (1983) and Knock Out (Νοκ Άουτ) by Paulos Tasios (1986). The most recent historical events, as well as the most recent folk culture, are presented in films such as 1922 by Nikos Koundouros (1978) and Rebetiko by Kostas Ferris (1983). Finally, there appear to be certain taboo themes that popular media normally avoids, such as homosexuality, which is the main topic in the film Angel (Άγγελος) by George Kantakouzenos (1982) (Sotiropoulou 2005, 142-3).

The limited access to funding in the 1970s and 1980s forced some younger NGC directors to shift towards cheaper productions, such as short-form stories and documentaries. The first genre emerged in the 1970s and is characterised by personal expression and experimentation, promoted by innovative young directors. Short films rarely become commercially successful; they are made to introduce the work of an unknown director and establish his/her reputation in the film industry. At the same time, they function as ‘film direction schools’ for various artistic experimentations. Some of the most popular NGC directors began their careers by filming short stories, such as The Broadcasting (Η Εκπομπή) by Theodoros Aggelopoulos (1968) and Jimmy the Tiger (Τζίμης ο Τίγρης) by Pantelis Voulgaris (1966). None of these films is nowadays regarded as a landmark of modern Greek cinema. On the other hand, documentaries form a purpose-specific political film genre and operate as ideological guides for various social movements. Some characteristic NGC documentaries are the Testimonies (Μαρτυρίες) by Nikos Kamvoukakis (1975), which discuss the Polytechnic Revolt, and Women Today (Οι Γυναίκες Σήμερα) by Popi Aloukou (1977), which discuss the lives of women in the Greek countryside (Kolovos 2002, 191-4).

The Price of Love by Tonia Marketaki

In this essay, The Price of Love by Tonia Marketaki (1984) is examined as a case study of the changes in the funding conditions of Greek cinema in the 1980s. It is also presented as an important case study of Greek independent film productions.

Tonia Marketaki graduated as a trained film operator in Paris in 1960 and was highly influenced by European cinema innovations of this period, particularly from the French Nouvelle Vague. This movement is also studied by many other NGC directors, including Theodoros Aggelopoulos, Alexis Grivas, Stavros Konstantarakos, Lambros Liaropoulos, and Nikos Panagiotopoulos. Her first short film, Yiannis and The Road (Ο Γιάννης και Ο Δρόμος), was produced in 1967, leading to her arrest and trial by the Colonel’s regime. She is sentenced to suspension and escapes to London, where she becomes an assistant to Jean-Luc Godard (born 1930) and Nicholas Ray (1911-1979).

She continues her career in the recently independent People’s Democratic Republic of Algeria, where she films documentaries for the Algerian Ministry of Agriculture (5). She returns to Greece in 1971 and participates in the Thessaloniki Film Festival in 1973 with the film Ioannis The Brutal (Ιωάννης ο Βίαιος), which receives a direction, scenario and first male performer’s award. In 1977, she directed the television series Lemon-forest (Λεμονόδασος) based on the homonymous novel by Kosmas Politis (6). In 1983, she directed the film The Price of Love (Η Τιμή της Αγάπης) based on the novel The Honour and Money (Η Τιμή και το Χρήμα) by Konstantinos Theotokis (1872-1923). The film received seven state awards in 1983 and the Golden Olive - Best Film Award at the Festival of Mediterranean Cinema in 1984. Her last film, Crystal Nights (Κρυστάλλινες Νύχτες) in 1992, explores a well-known historical event, the Kristallnacht, or Night of the Broken Glass, in 1938 Germany (Kyriakidis 2008, 65-9).

The Price of Love is filmed with the funding contributions of three parties: Andromeda Film Productions, the National Centre of Cinematography (NCC) and the public network Hellenic Radio-Television 1 (ERT-1). The film costs 25 million drachmas, which is a significant sum for 1983 standards (7). Tonia Marketaki explains that the film’s high cost is due to her commitment to maintain a high level of quality. She does not hesitate to film various scenes multiple times to achieve the desired result, and she emphasises the presence of many secondary actors on stage. During one of her interviews, she reveals her bitter feelings toward some of the colleague-directors, who applied pressure to the NCC to freeze the film’s funding (Argyriou 1994, 44). In the author’s view, this is the result of unfair competition among NGC film directors, who had to fight fiercely to gain access to already limited government funding, which was supposed to be distributed equally among a large number of directors (8).atic and ideological quests of the NGC, even though its director does not follow the modernity aesthetics and the peculiar film language, which are followed by other contemporary NGC directors. This is due to the topic chosen by Tonia Marketaki, which is tied to the past. The film’s story is set in Corfu at the beginning of the 20th century. Although the audience is transported to another period, the questions posed by Marketaki are timeless: they concern the woman’s role in a traditional, highly conservative society. She discusses the social changes during the early stages of industrialisation in the Greek countryside, which enabled new social values to emerge. Such social values are powerful enough to corrode the morality of the countryside’s people and to collapse the society’s traditional institutions. The film centres on a typical matriarchal family in the early 20th century operating in a strongly patriarchal society. This type of family motivates the director to discuss the dowry custom, which has the form of a compulsory social institution, legalised by tradition; the clash between men and women within the matriarchical and patriarchal families; the new economic realities of the industrial revolution; and finally, the collapse of the traditional aristocracy and the rise of political corruption within democracy. The above issues are cleverly addressed through a humane love story with an original, unexpected ending (Kyriakidis 2008, 68).

Tonia Marketaki recreates the atmosphere, moral values, and customs of the past in a realistic manner, without spending too much time on insignificant details (Kyriakidis 2008, 68). This approach contributes to the film’s aesthetics. According to the director, although the film has a folk identity, its aesthetics follow classical cinematography prototypes (Argyriou 1994, 49). In relation to these prototypes, Marketaki prefers a linear narration time. The plot's chronological sequence is interrupted only by flashbacks that introduce past events. Particular emphasis is placed on the realistic representation of the plot’s time and space (e.g. use of old-fashioned costumes, scenes shot in the old neighbourhoods of Corfu, use of regional dialect and idioms in the film’s dialogues, etc.). Finally, the camera is used from a static position, whether filming takes place in interior locations (e.g., the house of Siora Epistimi or the tavern) or in exterior locations (e.g., the island’s small bays or the fish market). With reference to the paintings of Nikiforos Lytras (1832-1904), Marketaki admits the film's ethographic character, which is not limited to a mere documentation of another era. The director uses her protagonists as symbols to promote a parallel understanding of the plot that offers deeper reflections on contemporary society. Such symbols are the distressed mother, the drunken father and the corrupt lover who takes advantage of an innocent young woman (Argyriou 1994, 49).

The film’s central theme is the moral collision between the individual female and the social environment surrounding her. Tonia Marketaki describes the struggles of a young woman fighting against social pressure and the psychological traps of a male-dominated society. This type of male-centred society takes advantage of human sentimentality and mental pain for economic profit. The film cleverly combines the questions posed by two philosophical theories of the 19th and 20th centuries: on one hand, Marxism defines the social and economic boundaries controlling a person’s life; on the other hand, Freudism defines the agonies of the human soul in order to liberate itself from the dead ends of Marxist determinism (Kolonias 2002, 7-8).

The story’s “item of desire” is not Rini, the beautiful protagonist, but her mother’s wooden chest, where she stores the savings of her entire life. Siora Epistimi trades with a smuggler, Andreas; she negotiates with him the price of illegal sugar, she lends him money at severe interest so that she can make some extra profit, and while all these are taking place, she does not realise that the final transaction with Andreas will be about her daughter’s honour. At this point, it needs to be clarified that the Greek word Timi (Τιμή) can have a dual meaning: price and honour. This is also the reason why the film’s title can be read as “The Price of Love” and “The Honour of Love” at the same time.

Andreas is a dishonourable former aristocrat who deliberately chooses smuggling over honest work. His illegal activities are hidden under his political status as the regional party chief. Furthermore, a corrupt government minister offers him his protection in exchange for political support. In this way, Marketaki openly confronts the parliamentary system, which serves the former elites' wish to sustain a sick social balance that still harms the lower social strata (9).

The film focuses on the early 20th-century industrial proletariat (10), the social group of Siora Epistimi. This proletariat maintains a strong fighting character against the ruling elites. For example, the workers hand out leaflets at the factory gate, comment on the recent redundancies, and prepare for a strike. Young men also assist the proletariat’s struggles. A young student, for example, interrupts the talk of the regional party chief (who is Andreas) and shouts to the workers: “Brothers, they are fooling you”. He calls on them not to vote against the strike, which only favours the interests of the king, the foreign powers and the industrialists. In Tonia Marketaki’s film, the proletariat is already awake and full of revolutionary morale. The people march in the streets and protest against the politicians by announcing “down with Theotokis, down with Deligiannis, down with Zaemis, poverty out” (“Κάτω ο Θεοτόκης, κάτω ο Δελιγιάννης, κάτω ο Ζαϊμης, έξω η φτώχεια”)! They sing the anthem “Forward march, the earth’s damned” (“Εμπρός της γης οι κολασμένοι”), which is associated with the Russian October Revolution.

Siora Epistimi is a dynamic working woman who supports her household and children on her own. Her husband is an alcoholic and cannot contribute to the family. This situation introduces a model of a matriarchal family in which the woman is the family’s core, carrying out multiple roles, such as mother, wife, worker, and businesswoman. In the film’s early 20th-century context, the working mother model is presented as a prophecy for the future of Greek society. This prophecy fulfilled itself in the 1980s with the delayed arrival of the feminist movement.

In the author’s own opinion, the relationship between mother and daughter in the film is likely to draw on Nietzsche’s critique of Marxism. According to Nietzsche, Marx’s class uprising is pointless and hypocritical. The least powerful social class overthrows the ruling class and takes its place. As human nature is greedy, the new ruling class becomes the oppressor of lower, less powerful social classes to secure economic profits that were once denied to it. The still-oppressed social classes will soon revolt against their new oppressors and will demand a share of these limited profits. This way, class uprising is a continuous process triggered by human greed (Vallianos 2000, 183). In the film, Siora Epistimi belongs to the oppressed proletariat, yet she is also Rini’s oppressor: she forces her daughter to build baskets, which she sells and cashes the proceeds in her own savings’ chest. At some point, she argues with her daughter regarding “the 300 Talara”, the money which Andreas demands as Rini’s wedding dowry. Rini becomes angry and shouts back at her that she has already worked too hard and has already produced this amount of money, as she is being constantly exploited by her own mother.

In Tonia Marketaki’s film, there are numerous mentions of class distinction and social inequality. Cars appear only twice in the film and symbolise wealth, particularly in the early 20th century. The first car is owned by the rich factory owner, who competes with the Kaiser, the German aristocrat who owns the second car in town. In another scene, the dirty and barefoot children of the workers play outside the factory. A well-dressed boy in a navy uniform, probably the child of a wealthy family, stares at them full of disappointment as he is not included in the game. Apparently, class distinction has no age.

The film also includes various references to the painful consequences of war and the tragedies of nationalism for the poor working classes. The workers in the tavern comment on the latest political developments, and one of them says, “Since when are we going to be bearing children to feed the war machine”? Tonia Marketaki strongly suggests that the dead people behind every war serve the economic interests of the rich and powerful. Such elites use nationalism and manipulate the concept of ‘homeland’ to convince the poor to fight and die for them (11). The miserable atmosphere in the tavern, which is associated with the poor, is assisted by its dim light, its black-coloured walls, the washing of the glasses in the wooden tub and the customers’ singing, which is not accompanied by any musical instruments. This scene contrasts with the party thrown by the minister’s wife, where the rich elite are gathered to hear a professional opera singer perform. Marketaki combines these scenes to show that the recreation of the poor is temporary and futile, serving to comfort them until they die in war for the rich.

The relationship between the state and the working classes is presented as unfair. The state’s representatives treat the poor in a suppressive and unjust manner. In the local olive press, the police threaten to arrest the poor farmer Roussis because his ‘lord’ (his employer) has unpaid debts to the state. The peasants realise this injustice and rebel against the state’s representatives. Such scenes suggest that modern workers are not their employers’ slaves and should not pay the price of the corrupt alliance between the state and the capitalists.

The film’s Freudian dimension is noted in Rini’s struggle against the oppressive social constraints of a small rural community. Rini is a born fighter, and she is determined to succeed, although she is not in control of the game’s rules. This determination is shown to her boyfriend, Andreas, when she repeats to him that “we are hard-workers; who are we in need of”? Unfortunately, Andreas does not share the same view; he comes from a corrupt social background and has no conception of honest hard work. At the end, Rini is meant to be abandoned; however, before this happens, she is willing to take her chances and enter into an ‘illegal’ relationship with Andreas. When this happens, she feels the strict, questioning glances of the village’s women, which represent social disapproval. Rini is under tremendous psychological pressure; therefore, she abandons her family and, without getting married, moves in with Andreas. Social disapproval is always present in her life, even during her first intercourse with her boyfriend. Instead of having her love fulfilled, Rini is physically and emotionally raped by Andreas, while the pedestrians listen to what is happening from the street. This scene introduces the concept of public shaming, which later takes the form of a ‘legalised’ custom at the carnival scene. At this point, it is worth clarifying that nude love scenes were rare in Greek cinema before the 1980s; therefore, The Price of Love marks an innovation.

The film’s final scene is full of distress, indignation and anger towards society and its official and unofficial institutions. Rini is forced to escape society’s criticism to maintain her personal honour and dignity. She moves to Athens, where she can live an anonymous life, work, and take care of her baby without having to deal with criticism from a small, narrow-minded rural community. In such an urban environment, Rini, who symbolises all working women of the 1980s, can promote matriarchy and develop her own feminist/proletariat consciousness (12). It is noteworthy that in this specific NGC film, urban migration is not presented as a problem but as a solution to the economic devastation and social oppression of the rural countryside.

Summary and conclusions

The sudden appearance of television in the early 1970s led to a steep decline in ticket sales at Greek cinema theatres. Film producers stop funding new films, particularly those expected to be less commercial; therefore, film directors turn to independent productions, which vary in terms of funding. Such productions are either paid for out of the directors’ own pocket (self-funded) or by independent art-loving sponsors who do not anticipate the film’s commercial success. From the beginning of the 1980s, the main film sponsor in Greece became the central government. Initially, the state supports domestic film production through the National Centre of Cinematography, and later, money is distributed by the three state television networks. This disengagement from the commercial production system contributes greatly to the aesthetic quality of Greek films, which are more focused on artistic expression than on profit-making. Such productions are characterised by innovations in their aesthetics, thematology, and discussion of modern social concerns. The directors’ aim becomes the promotion of a ‘revolutionary ideology’ destined to awaken social awareness (13).

An example of a multi-funded production is the 1983 film The Price of Love, directed by Tonia Marketaki. The film follows NGC's ideological and thematic orientations, yet not its aesthetic innovations. The director chooses a realistic, almost ethnographic, representation of a rural society of the early 20th century, whose customs and social institutions are gradually fading under the dynamic impact of capitalism and the ideology of the Industrial Revolution. In this social environment, paradoxically dominated by Marxist theoretical views, a young woman, Rini, tries to change her destiny, stand up to her family’s expectations, and reverse social determinism. The protagonist becomes a symbol of a personal revolution against economic, moral, social, class, and family constraints, which extend beyond the film’s chronological boundaries. Even though the author cannot detect differences between the Price of Love and the original novel by Konstantinos Theotokis on which the film was based, it is likely that the film constitutes an original and timeless artistic expression. It discusses a variety of modern considerations, such as matriarchy, feminism, class struggle, gender relationships, labour legislation, state corruption, misuse of authority, social psychological pressure, narrow-minded rural customs, emotional manipulation, illegal profit-making, people abuse, etc.

Bibliography

Argyriou, I., 1994, ‘Creativity as a natural phenomenon’ (Interview with Tonia Marketaki), in Kyriakidis, A. (ed.) Tonia Marketaki, 35th Film Festival of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki: The Thessaloniki Film Festival & The Greek Directors’ Fellowship, 44-9.
Kolonias, M., 2002, Tonia Marketaki, Athens: The Centre of Greek Cinema.
Kolovos, N., 2002, ‘Modern Greek Cinema’, in Konstantopoulou, D. (ed.) Modern Greek Theatre (1600-1940) – Cinema, Volume II, Greek Cinema, Patra: Greek Open University, 121-228.
Kyriakidis, A., 2008, ‘The way of Tonia Marketakli, Moteur (9), 65-9.
Sotiropoulou, Ch., 2005, The Diaspora in Greek Cinema, Athens: Themelio.
Vallianos, P., 2000, ‘The re-evaluation of values, the nihilism of morality and the mirage of superman: the joyful anger of Nietzsche’, in Vallianos, P. (ed.) Philosophy in Europe, Volume III, Modern and Current Philosophical Movements (19th-20th Century), Patra: Greek Open University, 177-97.

Filmography

Marketaki, T., 1983, The Price of Love (original title: Η Τιμή της Αγάπης), Greece: Independent Production.

Personal remarks

1. Unfortunately, the film funding procedures during the 1980s were rife with corruption and favouritism. Furthermore, funding accounts were never supervised by independent committees; therefore, the funding system was usually accessible to a limited circle of people. Tonia Marketaki and other independent film directors have commented on the levels of corruption in the funding system long before this paper was written.
2. To the modern reader, the above statement probably sounds confusing. In reality, until 1986, Greece had no private television networks, and all film funding originated from various manifestations of the central government. In other words, no matter how many state bodies offer funding, the money originates from the same source. This lack of alternative funding opportunities only promoted Soviet-style favouritism and state corruption.
3. In the author’s own view, this is also part of the NGC myth, as this was later promoted by cinema reviewers. A common practice in Greece, which the author still struggles to understand, is that anti-government views are almost exclusively promoted through government funding. In other words, how can anti-systemic propaganda be sponsored by the system itself? This has two possible explanations: firstly, no anti-systemic views are, in reality, promoted as anti-systemic; secondly, the broader levels of corruption in the system mask attempts to secure government funding through the promotion of harmless anti-systemic mambo jumbo. Whatever the case, it remains an oxymoron (if not a form of intentionally hidden political agenda) that the 1980s NCC state funding was directed towards NGC productions that criticised previous governments.
4. The author’s view is that this discussion took place long after the ‘bad days’ were over and was always from a mild ‘anti-systemic’ perspective, which complied with the NCC funding criteria. In reality, the NGC was not ‘revolutionary’; it absorbed government funding and promoted a different form of government ideology with its own political agendas. As for the Greek Left's quests, they were always promoted from a safe distance, with the certainty that the Greek Left was never meant to win elections or apply these ideological views in practice. When this happened accidentally between 2015 and 2019, the author’s view is that the Greek Left failed.
5. This same type of filming activity is described in a comedy book by the Greek journalist Vasilis Rafaelidis (1992), Memorial Service for an Unfinished Death (Μνημόσυνο για Έναν Ημιτελή Θάνατο), published in Athens by the Editions of the Twenty-First, noted in pages 308-13. It is the author’s personal understanding that Tonia Marketaki, Vasilis Rafaelidis, and other intellectuals of the Greek Left saw a potential socialist paradise rising under the pompous name of the People’s Democratic Republic of Algeria. In Rafaelidis’ own words, however, this experience was rather disappointing.
6. The real name of Kosmas Politis was Paraskevas Toveloudis (1888-1974), and he was a representative of the so-called ‘30s Generation, which was a pre-war intellectual movement.
7. In fact, this amount is astronomical. In 1983, the average salary was roughly 27,000 drachmas per month. By the time’s standards, the film's cost was almost equal to the pay of 77 workers for an entire year’s work!!! In 2022 and after various adventures with Greek inflation, 25 million drachmas would have been equal to 73,368 Euros. This is close to the current price of a two-bedroom flat in Athens, built in the early 80s.
8. The author apologises for this statement with a 14-year delay. The statement is obviously wrong and tailored to the needs of the original 2008 assignment. In reality, NCC funding was unspecified and never followed a specific budget plan; instead, the NCC was constantly bailed out by the central government. Secondly, there was no such thing as limited funding; as noted earlier, the amounts sponsored for certain films were astronomical. Finally, there might not have been so much competition for the NCC funds. Some directors who were favourable to the government had much greater access to government funds than those who were less favourable. The list of directors funded by the NCC in the 1980s is short, and the thematology of their films seems to repeat a specific political agenda. In the author’s personal view, this appears suspicious.
9. It is interesting that this ‘confrontation with political corruption’ takes place with funding from the favouritising and corrupt NCC. Again, the author of the current paper is only repeating what Tonia Marketaki suggested for the NCC funding system during her past interviews. As noted earlier, the author is still struggling to understand how, in Greece, the majority of people opposed to the system are actually working for or being funded by it.
10. This is probably a euphemism or an element of artistic imagination, as Greece never went through an industrial revolution and never developed such a proletariat. Marketaki is probably mixing up historical information to fit her own Marxist agenda, or perhaps the pseudo-Marxist agenda of the 1981 socialist government, which controlled the NCC funds.
11. This statement is strongly polarised, although this is exactly how the film reads. The film suggests that the consequences of war are felt only by the lower social classes, which is not true. In fact, wars are catastrophic and affect all members of society, even though their consequences may differ for everyone. The film also implies that early 20th-century Greek nationalism aligned only with the interests of the rich elite. There can be strong arguments against this point, as the Great Idea, the two Balkan Wars, and the First World War that followed were based on political decisions that enjoyed strong public support. As for the economic benefits of the rich, at the end of this war, there were none. In 1922, Greece found itself in a dreadful situation that persisted for a long time. The economic devastation stemmed from the fact that the country’s economy was almost exclusively agricultural. The idea of a war situation in which the rich industrialists profited from the dead working classes might have existed in 1917 Russia; however, this had nothing to do with early 20th-century Greece.
12. The meaning of this specific statement remains an enigma to the author, even though he wrote it back in 2008. The author’s most recent life experience has shown him that in modern Greece, terms such as matriarchy, feminism, and proletariat are expressions of fake identity that reflect the broader confusion caused by the teachings of Post-modernity.
13. In due time, this type of cinema only managed to put public awareness back to sleep, only in a different ideological bed. It is no joke that after the technological advances of the early 21st century and the conquests of information technologies, the NGC and its politically manipulated quests were abandoned due to public disregard.