In a small town somewhere in Greece, it’s the men who hold all the power. Women seem to accept it – until the arrival of Eleni (Aurora Marion). There’s another way, she insists, and soon, even the leader’s only female protégée, Maria (Melissanthi Mahut), can’t resist her spell. Evi Kalogiropoulou talks to us about her feature debut, Gorgonà [+leggi anche:
recensione
intervista: Evi Kalogiropoulou
scheda film], which has screened in Venice’s International Film Critics’ Week.

Cineuropa: It’s pleasing to see more genre cinema at the biggest films festivals, isn’t it?
Evi Kalogiropoulou: I’ve always been interested in genre, even though I come from a, let’s say, more intellectual background as a painter, and a visual and video artist. I love exploitation, I love Tarantino. I wanted to make a genre film from a female perspective because, as you probably know, there still aren’t that many of them made by women.

Even when I was developing it, people kept asking: “Why don’t you make a social drama? Why don’t you talk about women and their reproductive rights?” It’s such a conservative point of view that limits what women can talk about. If this is what you’re interested in, sure, go ahead. I wanted to experiment.

You film is loud and very in-your-face. It’s fun to see that because I assume you didn’t have an unlimited budget?
I would have liked to do even more. I love martial-arts scenes, for example, but they are expensive. Still, it’s ok having to limit yourself in art. In Greece, we learn to be flexible; we have to be.

You mix Greek mythology and trashy films. There’s also something very Mad Max-ish about this whole universe.
Yeah, it was Mad Max, for sure. But also Claire Denis, Quentin Tarantino and Greek films from the 1970s. I took their aesthetic, and then tried to change it a little. It’s a little bit of genre, a little bit of arthouse. It’s fun when things clash like that.

I was thinking about sirens, Persephone and her mother, Demeter – we shot in Elefsina, where this myth allegedly takes place – and about the myth of Medusa. She can turn people into stone just by looking at them; she has snakes instead of hair. But her story is tragic – she was raped by Poseidon in Athena’s temple. Furious, Athena turned her into a monster, even though she was a victim of violence! A woman punishes another woman because she was raped.

In the film, a woman can punish another woman – she can also support her. Your female characters are resigned to their fate until Maria and Eleni dare to question it.
In Greece, we are facing a massive crisis. There are so many femicides, and people are wondering why this keeps happening – is the pandemic to blame? Either way, women are dying every single day. When they say we have the same rights… That’s bullshit. Even when I’m driving around in Greece, people cuss at me just because I’m a woman. My film might feel violent, but that’s how women’s lives are in so many places. You have to fight for your power.

You also have to be angry. There’s anger in this story.
These characters have every right to be. I’m angry every day. You look at Trump, you look at what is happening in Palestine, and you wonder what the fuck is wrong with the world. Eleni shows up in this universe and people go: “She’s a witch.” Everyone points their finger at her, but “the witch” is actually someone on the inside. Coming back to those myths I mentioned, history shows us that women were always criminalised as witches or monsters. I wanted to subvert it.

She tells Maria: “You don’t have to be like these men.” It’s an important message.
Don’t be like a man: just be a woman. Be a woman on your own terms. That’s the dream, I guess, also for me as a director. Instead of having people telling me to be more subtle, I want to be loud and edgy. I like action! Since I was a kid, I’ve been reading a lot of comics and loved seeing all these women with their special powers. I want to make other revenge films in the future and show the power of our body. Femininity can mean so many different things.

Revenge stories, even something like Kill Bill, can be so satisfying. Someone starts out as a victim and turns her destiny around.
I like it when I go to the cinema and, at the end, I think: “Yes. We killed those bastards.” Not in reality, of course, but it can be a great feeling, and it’s so rare in cinema these days. I want people to feel satisfied, like I was after watching The Substance [+leggi anche:
recensione
trailer
intervista: Coralie Fargeat
scheda film].