Theodoros Angelopoulos

Theodoros Angelopoulos (27/04/1935 - 24/01/2012)

Theodoros Angelopoulos was a Greek director, script writer and movie producer. He received awards inside and outside Greece, its most important being the Golden Phoenix for Best Movie at the Cannes Festival in 1998, with his film “Eternity and a Day”.

He was born in Athens in 1935. He enrolled at Law School of University of Athens, however he never completed. In 1961, he went to Paris, where he initially studied French philology and filmography at the University of Sorbonne, as well as ethnology courses. Later, he started film courses at the Film School IDHEC and Musee de l’homme. Returning to Greece in 1964, he worked as a critic at a newspaper. In 1965, he made his first attempt at movie directing, while in 1968, he made his first public appearance with a short film called Broadcast at the Thessaloniki Film Festival in 1968. In 1970, his first feature film, Representation, won the grand prize at the Thessaloniki Film Festival, as well as many distinctions abroad, marking the dawn of Modern Greek cinematography. His films that were presented in the following years were also highly praised at international festivals, and helped him establish a reputation of one of the most important directors of modern cinema. He was also named Honorary Doctor of Philosophy at the University of Brussels, the Nanterre University in Paris and Essex University. He was also the cofounder of the Greek magazine Modern Cinema.

On 24 January 2012, while shooting for his new film “The other sea” in Drapetsona in Piraeus, he was gravely injured by a vehicle while trying to cross the street. He died that night and his funeral was done on public expenditure on 27 January. That year, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, as well as the Thessaloniki Film Festival, introduced the International Award “Theodoros Angelopoulos” as homage to the memory of the great Greek director. The award is given annually during the Thessaloniki Film Festival in November. Learning of Angelopoulos’ death, Emir Kusturica said that he had always been inspired by the latter’s films and formed his viewpoint on cinema.