FRANCE, GREECE, ITALY
EDEN À L'OUEST
2009 – 35mm – c - 111’
Direction: Costantin Costa Gavras
Screenplay: Jean-Claude Grumberg, Constantin Costa Gavras
Cinematography: Patrick Blossier
Editing: Yannick Kergoat
Set design: Alexandre Bancel, Konstantinos Papageorgiou
Music: Armand Amar
Costumes: Ioulia Stavridou, Mathé Pontanier
Cast: Riccardo Scamarcio, Julian Koehler, Ulrich Tukur, Eric Caravaca, Anny Duperey
Production: K.G., Odeon, Pathé Renn Productions, France 3 Cinéma, Novo Rpi, Greek Television Et-1, Greek Film Center, East Media Services
SYNOPSIS
Elias is an illegal immigrant who, with other desperate men like him, goes through Europe and from the Aegean Sea, after manyadventures, gets to Paris looking for a better future.
DIRECTOR’S STATEMENT
Everyone has a story.
The beggar who raises a bowl has a story.
The woman who sleeps drunk on the subway vent has a story.
The man who, like Charlie Chaplin, flees at the mere sight of a cop’s uniform
has a story.
As in the Iliad, the adventures of our legendless hero begin in the Aegean
Sea. On the same sea and under the same sun and sky that witnessed the
dawn of civilization.
After many brief adventures, including a stopover in Paradise, and a brief
one in Hell, his epic ends magically in Paris. A Paris that sparkles in the
dreams of every wanderer’s restless sleep.
My film tries to mirror these wanderings, and is the story of those – who like
us or our fathers and mothers before us – crisscrossed the earth, defying
the oceans and uniformed bullies, in a search of a roof over their heads.
The story of Elias is not that of Ulysses. Nor is it Jean-Claude’s or mine. But I
do see something of me in Elias, this stranger who is no stranger to me…
I also do see something of my eyes in the look others cast over him.
FESTIVAL
Shown at Berlinale out of competition
