Stella, femme libre

(Originally posted at 18 May 2002)

One of the best Greek films ever released. Its highlights are the great acting of Melina Mercouri (she was robbed away the Cannes Best Actress Award) and the music of Manos Hadjidakis - he won an Oscar for "Never on Sunday" (1960).

This Greek version of Carmen was first written as a play but was immediately adapted to the big screen to be used for the cinema premiere of Ms Merkouri. It was both a critical and box office success and won international acclaim (Golden Globe for Best Foreign Film, 1955).

Many supporting actors (Alekos Alexandrakis, Tasso Kavadia, Voula Zoumpoulaki, Sofia Vembo, the list is long...) do a great job and all the songs of film are cherished and performed to this day, the most known of them being the dramatic: "Agapi Pou Gines", that foreshadows the ending of the film - one of the most recognizable films of Greek cinema...

One of the best Greek films ever released. Its highlights are the great acting of Melina Mercouri (she was robbed away the Cannes Best Actress Award) and the music of Manos Hadjidakis (he won an Oscar for Nener on Sunday(1960).

Another film from filmmaker KAkKOGIANNIS He brought the Greek Cinema up from being mediocre and i have seen this film many times even when i was only 18 years old and ii have never forgotten it. This film was nominated for awards as was his other films He was a genius at his craft. The players are excellent not to mention the great singer Sofia Vembo who does sing two songs in the picture It is two bad that she only made just three films. She deserves much more credit than she gets here. Her recordings are heard on the 28th of October of each year which is a national holiday in Greece OXI day against the fascists who tried to conquer Greece. She made many recordings and her memory will endure forever. Again i recommend this film very highly.

Still today, absorbing viewing, this Bazouki melodrama has many of the faults, features and personnel of the Greek home consumption cinema of the fifties but scenes like Alexandrakis' tilted stagger along the white street while his sex-bomb old flame is making out with the football hero or the country picnic with the child dancing along with Vembo's song, generate attention rarely matched there.

The business of Mercouri's first number proving a fiasco creating suspense about whether she actually can deliver is, of course, the device used in 8 MILE.

The film making is a bit rough. This one is not shot by English cameraman Walter Lassally who did most of Cacoyannis' work and some of it looks like it was lit with a searchlight. However the people who will make an impression are already visible - Hadjidakis, Aldredge, Cacoyanis and it's leads, the vibrant Mercouri and virile Foundas who would figure in all the director's early work and should have had as substantial a career as any of them.

It is my opinion that this film is the best film ever created in Greece. This a story of Greek female singer who is full of passion and despises any social or moral "must". She is living her life like nobody else. Until our anti-hero Stella meets her destiny in the face of Miltos, a man who will try anything in order to make her his. Of course, a passion can have only one tragic end. The direction of Michalis Cacoyiannis is superb. The stars Melina Mercouri, Giorgos Fountas and Alekos Alexandrakis are some of the best actors that the Greek cinema and theathre has created. Also the music is made by an Oscar winner composer, named Manos Hadjidakis, and it reflects all the emotions that the actors have. If you can not understand what Mediterranean passion means, see this film, and you will. SUPERB!!!