Time: 6:15 pm
Writer/Director: Vardis Marinakis
Feature (2009): 106 min
BLACK FIELD is set in 1654, when Greece was under Ottoman Empire occupation. A Janissary (a Greek warrior recruited by force at a small age from his Christian family to serve at the Turkish army) arrives heavily wounded at a remote Christian female monastery. He is nursed by Anthi, a young Greek nun who has taken an oath of silence. They fall in love against all odds. But Anthi is tormented by a dark secret soon to be revealed: she is, in fact, a boy who grew up as a girl hidden in the monastery, in order to avoid being captured and becoming a Janissary. The two lovers escape to the nearby forest, in search of freedom from society’s constraints and lose themselves in a dreamlike reality until they are captured and brought back to face all they left behind …
Director’s Note
Black Field is a cross gender love story of two people with mistaken identities. It is story inspired by true events that transcends time, religion and sexual identity… a dark fairytale for adults following the tradition of directors like Terrence Mallic and Andrei Tarkovski; it narrates an archetypal story using powerful visuals to depict the sacredness, fear, poetry and beauty that surround human beings and their relationship with nature.
Awards
- SILVER GIRALDILLO AWARD and BEST ACTRESS for Sofia Georgovassili at Seville European Film Festiva
- The YOUNG JURY PRIZE at Cinema Tous Ecrans Festival
- The SPECIAL JURY AWARD for Technical Excellence (camera/script/costume) at Mumbai Film Festival
- The Hellenic Film Academy Awards for BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY and BEST SETS.