An...

Finally, a decent mainstream Greek movie and by that i mean a movie that hasn't artistic pretensions, i.e. isn't difficult to watch, her message is understandable and deals with everyday matters that concern everybody. I confess that i wasn't excited about Papakaliatis previous work in television, but this was a fine surprise!

I also loved the reference to the golden age of the Greek cinema by the clever association with a well known and beloved,old Greek movie, that will unfortunately be lost to foreign audiences.

As mentioned by others here, the movie owes an artistic debt to "Sliding Doors" the 1998 movie by Peter Howitt, starring Gwyneth Paltrow, as it deals also with the effect that individual choices have on our future reality, no matter how insignificant they seem at the time we are making them.

But the movie is still slow, but not necessarily boring.

What does fate hold for you ... well you find out one idea through this story. Same guy ... two different decisions. One decision causes him to suffer loneliness and pain but he finds a reward at the end. The other decision causes him to find a reward at the start but eventually causes him to suffer pain, conflict, and loneliness.

So what does this say about fate? Absolutely nothing ... in my view. Either way whatever decision you make the result is the same - you just don't know in what order you will experience it.

So la-te-da!

In his "Notebooks", the famous conductor Wilhelm Furtwängler doesn't make much effort to conceal his dislike for Art critics. He likens the creator of Art with Faust and the critic with Mephistopheles, saying about the latter that, whatever is born of love, he considers worthy of extinction! He also notes that the main concern of the critic is to identify the "errors" in the work of Art, often failing to recognize the greatness of a true masterpiece.

Furtwängler's remarks came to my mind while observing the anxious efforts by movie critics to discover and point out the "errors" in "An...", the first feature film by Greek director Christoforos Papakaliatis (Greece, 2012). I must confess that I myself entered the theater with reservations. Would this prove to be just another cinematic experiment from one more director of television shows who fails to see the difference between the two-dimensional flat space of TV and the much more complex space-time of the cinema?

The result of the "experiment" was a pleasant surprise! We saw an authentic cinematic creation, skillfully directed and possessing a brilliantly self-consistent (albeit not entirely original) script worked well in the details. With regard to the central idea of the film, the influence from the now classic "Sliding Doors" (1998) is more than evident. Like the latter film, "An..." is a cinematic allegory on the "butterfly effect", that is, how a seemingly insignificant detail may dramatically change the order of things and the fate of people. We thus watch two alternative versions of reality evolve in parallel in time by means of two different dominoes of causality.

One basic theme is romantic relationships and their test against deterioration caused by the everyday routine in a typical marriage. Reference is made, of course, to the current economic crisis, this being one of the catalytic factors affecting relationships. Eventually, the film leaves it upon the viewer to decide which version of reality suits best to her/him, hinting, however, at the more optimistic choice (remember "Sliding Doors"!).

We left the theater with feelings of internal catharsis that any true work of Art must induce. Leaving behind for good the painful memories from the merciless (albeit directorially brilliant) "Amour" that plainly shows brutal reality without the much-needed psychological balance offered by the potentially alternative...

Well,i have seen also other projects of Papakaliatis and i must admit that he is truly talented in cinematography,montage,directing,really sparkling up all hiς characters an always tend to create great and memorable films. In this movie is doing again the same,the beautiful same,he has great photography of Plaka Athens,an interesting story of parallel universes and also an original one,a speed directing with Hollywood touches just to remind us of how he likes to copy/paste the all American great romance movies,the bonus material for sure is the reference to an original and classical romance story,a great Greek comedy called "Well the woman to be afraid of man" which is a phrase from Orthodox Greek weddings. The two stars Kontou and Konstantinou really steals our hearts with their heart full performances. The only disadvantage i believe is,once more,the of papakaliatis to be also the start of ALL of his movies. Fail for sure cause finally he must understand that he is a terrible actor,a terrible one. He is real a great talent but really christoforos,go along with it,you can do everything and i personally respect you for that but YOU CAN NOT ACT. Never the less a great effort of Greek cinema,you have my 7 out of 10 which could be even higher if he not had the obsession of doing EVERYTHING in his movies. Watch it!

Being a Greek myself i must say i'm pretty disappointed by Greece's efforts towards the seventh art the last couple of decades. Unfortunately Greece's golden age, in my opinion, stopped at late 70's to early 80's. However this, i must say, is a sparkle in the mud of the industry. Christoforos Papakaliatis being a director, writer and leading actor did a fine job being all three of them. He conducted a modern movie touching sensitive matters in Greece nowadays, like unemployment does, mixing them with the never aging love cliché. What matters in the end are the emotions you have leaving the movie, and those were strong.