Milad – My Planet…
Jelani married a woman from a different tribe. To avoid getting killed, they fled their country. On foot – and any other way possible – they finally arrived at a river, months later. Some die crossing it; others manage to swim across and enter Europe. But, once they set foot in Greece, the first adjacent European country, they found themselves homeless and socially excluded, without being able to move on or go back. The only solution is to travel illegally to Germany, that’s what the smugglers say. They don’t have enough money for the whole family to pass. Jelani faces this dilemma and has to choose. If one of the children leaves unaccompanied and arrives in Germany sound and safe, it will be able to bring the whole family there. Jelani’s children will have to learn violently what it’s like to discover their own planet or how they can create one from scratch – and whether Germany is the solution or just a new nightmare.
The Return
Can theater as an education and rehabilitation medium help underage inmates, who stage their own lives, to overcome the limitations and obstacles of prison? Can theater become an educational and rehabilitation medium for underage inmates who have no chance of escaping disobedience? In a teenage prison, the inmates stage their own lives and become protagonists of a film that attempts to overcome the limitations and obstacles of a “correctional” institution.
My Cotton Family
Will these pregnant women or with underage children, alone, find a shelter and be reunited with their families that are scattered around the world? Mothers with their underage children or pregnant women, alone, persecuted in their countries for political and social reasons, find shelter in a house in Syngrou Avenue, Athens, where a group of specialists help them integrate in society and find the members of their families that are scattered in other countries. These women, who had no other choice than exile, find in that shelter the support they need in order to lawfully redefine their future in a strange continent.
Beyond Limits
A school in a juvenile prison? Can underage inmates – convicted for life to recidivism – find the means there to make a new start in their lives? A prison turns into a bright pause from hard life, when a group of teachers decides to found a school in juvenile prison of Avlona; as a result, knowledge and culture invade the young inmates’ lives, who would not have access to them in any other way. The years of detention become a useful flash of light in the lives of people who grow old deprived of basic social rights and convicted to recidivism. In prison’s school, they find the means to make a new start. Will they make it?
Theatre and Reality
Can documentary and reality become a theatrical play where the “protagonists” redefine institutions and their own lives on stage? Document and reality become a theatrical performance and real life heroes become the “protagonists” of their own lives on stage, demanding a better prospect. The protagonists of the documentary theater play are the people of Lygourio village who, through their narration on stage, depict the history of Epidaurus Festival, along with some doubts about this institution, and the Greek Railways employees who discover the importance of the railways both in their lives and the history of modern Greek life.
Greek Animal Rescue
Why are wounded stray dogs from Greece so popular for adoption abroad? Is there a hope for the ill-fated dogs, and an ill-fated area near Athens? A gravely ill, abused three-legged stray dog, abandoned in the industrial desert of Aspropyrgos, a town near Athens; a London-based charity whose mission is to help the neglected animals of Greece; a group of young volunteers who patrol Aspropyrgos and attend to the strays – these are the characters of the film found in a nightmarish place, a hellhole for many abandoned animals. Does the sick three-legged hound stand any chance of getting adopted, becoming healthy again and running across the fields of Essex? Why are the Greekies – the strays from Greece – so popular when it comes to being adopted abroad? With an unexpected ending, the film tries to discover whether there is any hope for the doomed dogs and for a doomed area outside Athens. A cinematic allegory of the Greek circumstances during the crisis based on true stories taking place in “invisible” districts near Athens that tourists and Athenians often ignore. The stories of stray animals depict – with a cinematic precision – everything that happens in Greece in times of crisis and motivate a London based charity, that discovered this by chance, to start a European campaign aiming at awakening all those who live “protected” and trapped in big cities.
Should I Stay Or Should I Go?
Six Greeks put their real stories on stage and wonder whether they should stay in Greece during the crisis or go. So, will they stay or will they go? Six Greeks perform their true stories on stage wondering whether they should stay in the Greece of the crisis or leave. A German tries to understand whose fault this is and all together they attempt a new kind of theatre that turns documentary into a theatrical play. The camera follows the true lives of the heroes both in Berlin and Athens and along with the audience gets involved in the real stories of the protagonists that play themselves on stage. So, should they stay or should they go?
The Second Chance
Is there ever a second chance in real life? A young inmate from Lithuania learns Greek in the prison’s school and aspires to study at the Technical University. Will he make it? “…You go out in the yard. On a bench, you find some prisoners talking about how they will break the law without getting caught. On other benches, prisoners talk about drugs and Kalashnikovs. And suddenly, you see a big Lithuanian guy with some other inmates of the same proportions playing chess…” These are the words of a music teacher that is currently incarcerated in the Special Youth Detention Center in Avlona, Greece. Is there ever a second chance in real life? A young man from Lithuania finds himself imprisoned in a youth detention center in a foreign country where he doesn’t even speak the language. He can either stay in his cell and give up everything or find a way to redefine his life. He may even try to learn Greek in the prison’s school, discover his hidden talents and study at the Technical University one day. Will he succeed? For three years, he strives to fulfill these seemingly unattainable goals as the camera records his anguish to start his life from scratch.
Matternet
Can drones support – for peaceful purposes – Third World cities that find themselves secluded because of weather conditions and poverty? A new network of transportation and communication, or a science-fiction scenario? Andreas Raptopoulos, an engineer from Greece, travels around the world and invents new applications that try to find a solution to social problems. In Singularity University, in NASA’s premises, organized by another scientist of the Greek diaspora, Peter Diamandis succeeds in making a utopian dream come true: Raptopoulos is the first one to build drones for peaceful purposes as a means to help Third World populations and cities that find themselves secluded because of weather conditions and poverty. A course that starts in a Technical School in Greece, and passes from London before going to San Francisco, Silicon Valley, Amazon.com, and finally the steep mountains of Mongolia, creating a new network for transportation and communication, which is no longer science fiction.
Start Up Means… I Begin
Unemployed Greeks find ways to carry out venturesome dreams and impossible ideas by giving birth to dynamic and ambitious startups in Silicon Valley. Unemployed Greeks, trying to promote their business abroad, arrive at Silicon Valley. The successful Greeks of California support and guide them by financing their bold dreams and impossible ideas, giving birth to new startups. Some of these startups become sought-after and are sold to big companies, like Tech behemoth Google, while their creators present them on camera, describing the whole process, the know-how, exonerating failure, giving a significant meaning to innovation.
My Raft
The jobless “new poor” in times of crisis through the first Greek street-magazine find again their hopes so they can get a home, a job, study and a position in the society that has excluded them. They found themselves homeless in a city that doesn’t know how to help them. The jobless “new poor” of our country have no hope. John Bird, an ex-homeless man and the homeless street paper he created in London, is the starting point, and, through his advice, the film follows Christos Alefantis and his team, as they lay the basis for their “Raft”, the Greek street paper “Shedia”. The camera documents the printing of the first issue, along with the worries whether this endeavor will succeed, so that excluded people are able to find a home, get a permanent job, study and reclaim their position in the society that has chased them away.
Kick Out Poverty
The National Homeless football team competes with other homeless teams from around the globe and proves that football can become an important “weapon” against social seclusion. A football team represents Greece in a world cup and wins the Fair Play Award. The Greek Homeless Football Team competes with other homeless teams (like the Indonesia team whose players are HIV positive) in Poland. The film follows the homeless players in their first journey abroad, while they score and receive goals, and prove that football, sοcialization and tolerance can become important “weapons” for one to deal with the hardships of a life that seems lost and tries to find ways to deal with social exclusion.
