PRESS RELEASE
The Curtain Rises - 7th Peloponnisos International Documentary Festival
The curtain of the 7th Peloponnisos International Documentary Festival rises on the 18th of June, with the screening of two special documentaries in collaboration with EKOME. These are two student thesis documentary films, "One School, Two Worlds" and "Never Tell Yourself 'It's Too Late'", for which EKOME took upon themselves the pilot project of special subtitling and captioning. The aim is to integrate audiences with hearing and vision problems into the screenings. The event will be prefaced by Stelios Kymionis, Head of the Digital Content Development and Management Department of EKOME and Irini Andriopoulou, Head of the Research, Studies and Educational Programs Department of EKOME.
This year's complete Festival program is comprised by 58 international and 27 Greek documentaries. The Jury that will award the Best Greek Documentary Award on July 25 in Sparta consists of Eleni Alexandrakis (director), Robbie Eksiel (journalist-film critic) and Konstantinos Blathras (film journalist-critic).
The awards of the Festival will be given on Sunday, July 4 in Kalamata. The Equality Award will be presented by Laura Cini (Italy-Director), Anne Kjersti Bjørn (Norway-Director) and Panagiotis Evangelidis (Greece-Screenwriter/Director). The Best Documentary Award will be given out following a digital vote by the online audience of the Festival. The "Claiming Freedom" Award will be awarded by the Student Jury of the Department of Theatrical Studies of the University of Peloponnese, in the context of the Festival's collaboration with that department.
The Peloponnese Documentary Festival features a series of seminars, given by renowned international documentary creators, such as the Dutch director Robert Rombout and the Italian director Tekla Taidelli. It should be noted that pre-festival events have already started in Kalamata with the seminar "Making a Documentary - Portraits", in which 11 students from the Department of Theatrical Studies of the University of Peloponnese participate. Under the technical direction of Robert Rombout, the students will present faces of the city, people next door, each from their own point of view.
This year, the Art of Comics is on the forefront, with the international exhibition "The 7th Art meets the 9th" taking place, featuring both Greek and foreign artists (Giuseppe Palumbo, Andrea Bruno, Danijel Zezely, Thanassis Petrou, Soloup, George Botsos, Soto Anagno). The exhibition is curated by the creative team of the International Comics Festival of "Babel" magazine. At the same time, on June 20, the first presentation of Soloup's graphic novel "21: The Battle of the Square" will take place. On June 26, a fascinating masterclass will be held by George Botsos and Andrea Bruno. George Botsos will talk about the relationship between comics and cinema, the nature of the comics page as visual narrative and the function of the succession or the sequence of images; while the internationally renowned Italian Andrea Bruno will elaborate on his personal approach to creating a comic in relation to creating a documentary.
The closing ceremony of the Festival in Kalamata will take place on the 4th of July with the director Tassos Boulmetis' film "Mythopathy", within the context of the cultural program "Cinema The Station". In this program, the old railway stations in Kalamata, Tripoli, Patras and Messolonghi come to life again, for a single night, and are transformed into the summer cinema "O Stathmos" (“The Station”), showing award-winning films from modern Greek cinema.
The films of the Festival will travel throughout the network of the cities of Peloponnese, in Sparta, Patras, Gythio, Xylokastro, Amaliada, Akrata, Dimitsana, Levidi and Derveni until July 28. The screenings will take place in open spaces, in adherence to public safety instructions for the protection of the audience, the guests and the staff.
The International Documentary Festival of Peloponnese is organised by the Creative Documentary Centre of Kalamata, with the support of the Ministry of Culture, EKOME and EKK, in co-organisation with the Regions of Western Greece and Peloponnese as well as with the Municipalities of the Network. The Communication Sponsor is ERT3, ERT Kalamata and the Parliament Television.
Like every year, all screenings, seminars and parallel activities are free.
Interpretation in sign language will be organized throughout the whole Festival.
Artistic Director: Gina Petropoulou
Artistic Advisor: Kleoni Flessa
Communication Sponsor: ERT3, ERT KALAMATA, Parliament Television