it is usually mentioned as the first gay film and for sure in 1982 it was a great shock to anyone to watch such a film, especially when it managed to win the three main awards in the Thessaloniki Film Festival. If you hate spoilers don’t read the rest of it, and don’t see the trailer that reveals all (don’t ask me why).

Angelos is a young gay guy in his early twenties living in Athens. He comes from a dysfunctional family, with an acoholic lazy father, an hysterical mother and a handicapped sister. As it is expected he hides his sexuality from his family. When he meets a sailor Michalis he falls hard for him and decides to move in with him. Michalis slowly makes him go out in drag and pushes him into prostitution. Angelos slowly enters in a dark world, selling out his body for money, on his lover profit. During this period he learns that his grandomtehr and hsi mother were also prostitutes, while he is called to join the army. Still he goes on working in the streets, till one day his beaten up by some furious policemen while being with a client. The army decharges him and his secret is revealed to his family, leading his father to commit suicide out of shame. Slowly Angelos realizes that he is being taken advantage by his male lover and he ends up killing him.

The film is based on a true story and it tries hard to stay on the objective side of things. In a way Giorgos Katakouzinos’ direction tries to embrace his problematic character and shows the narrow minded and blind society that surround him in the darkest colours possible, without trying to excuse his hero’s actions. Angelos is one of these doomed characters that really has not a slight piece of hope left, and that is the biggest problem of this movie. Even when Angelos is in love and actually happy he is never left a single moment of  happiness.

His family is a great burden and actual nightmare, a problem on its own, while he has to struggle with his sexuality. His lover is one of these bastards that take advantage of him nearly from the start and no matter what goes on in his life Angelos seems too lost and confused to actually enjoy it. His quest for love just leads him to the next bad step. The worst of all is that this kind of story is too close to the truth of the early 80’s Greece, where prostitution was one of the few solutions left for uneducated gay guys. No matter how hard Katakoyuzinow tries to live up some scenes on a gay party, or some frivolity moments with the transvestites in the streets, Angelos’ fate is over imposed on the film making it a bit monotonous.

The bad lighten shots come over you and adds to the ill-fated story we watch, while Michalis Maniatis interpretation of the young guy lacks any effort of change of mood. On one hand he is good with his quite behaviour and his lost look, as he highlights Angelos nearly pathetic view of life, leaving himself being led by others. On the other hand he never manages to rise above the rythmless script, staying to quite and to transparent even in moments that a reaction is needed. You cannot blame the brave actor for this, as I think it was Katakouzinos’ will to let his hero being blown by the wind. On the other side Katerina Helmy manages to shine in her much better written and hysterical role, while the former Minister of Education Eleni Kourkoula plays her first role as a mentally handicapped girl.

What really makes the movie tick is the way it potrays the hypocrisy of the greek society in some key scenes of the movie. The shocked village throwing stones to Angelos’ grandmother when she started revealing dark secrets for the whoring of different women in the village in their husbands’ knowledge, the way the alcoholic and lazy father decides to commit suicide ashamed of his son, the shocked policemen that beat angelos, the police director who cannot accept that a soldier is also a faggot, the way Michalis tries to stay as mucho as he can depsite sleeping with men. Small moments that link you with a harsh reality that is still alive and kicking (you in the face).

The 126 minutes of the film are quite longer from what the script could support and Katakouzinos tries to say everything in one story, without totally controlling it and loosing in the decoupage game, but still it was the first and fearfully the last film in the 80’s that could go into that path (plus it was a time when greek “quality movies” had to have great silences and a slow paced rythme). He won me over for trying to show Angelos’ effort to break free, for falling into kitsch and camp only because of the ’80’s and not becauuse of his subject, for trying to show society’s faults, for turning againist hyposcrisy, for adding to the greek filmography men kissing and having sex. Maybe he never manages to balance everything but still is a must see for any one intrested in queer cinema around the world, despite the usual faults.