Amerika Square

I think Amerika Square is the second Greek film that I've watched in my life (I won't consider Costas Gravas films as Greek, he's French-Greek and all his studies and career has gone by in France). Amerika Square tells a tragic, very present story, with a dark sense of humor. Two friends in their 40's deal in a totally opposite way with the tragic consequences of the refugee crisis in their neighborhood in Athenas.

While the film takes a leftist stance, the way it portraits the nationalistic-xenophobic character is not totally absurd or sectarian, on the contrary, it makes you understand (understanding is not the same as agreeing) why he has ended up thinking like that. It shows the drama of those that have lost their land and references by being forced to flee their home, but also the drama of those that because of the economical crisis and the changes to their neighborhood brought about by the massive arrival of "the others", no longer feel at home. The element in the psyche of this character that is senseless to me is that he seems to profess the same level of hate for all immigrants, regardless of whether they are Polish Christians, Peaceful Asian guys, or Muslims. I think it's quite unlikely to find an attitude like that save in the most extreme far-right bastards.

A very human film that makes you understand the desperation on both sides. This understanding stems from the fact that on both sides the film shows us the good ones. The main immigrants, save for the Russian maphia, are nice people that just want a chance for a better life (they are not Islamist scum or social aid parasites). The same goes for the 'xenophobe', he's not an educated motherfucker with some crazy theory of race and ancestry, but a poor guy that can not find a job, suffers seeing the degradation of his neighborhood and longs for the peaceful, cohesive society of his childhood.

The other Greek film that I'm aware of having watched, Plato's Academy also had immigration, economical crisis and xenophobia as its main topic. I watched that film in FIC Xixon 2010, so we were in the middle of the huge crisis caused by the economy crash of 2008, but quite before the migrant crisis, and a bit before the rise of Golden Dawn, the nazi scum party. Already at that time ordinary Greeks were fucked by their poor economy and some of them were angry to 'the others', the Albanians mainly.