Trilogy – The Weeping Meadow

The director of Eternity and a Day, Greek filmmaker Theo Angelopoulos, has begun a new trilogy that he calls an ‘elegy on human fate’. Created as a poetic summary of the 20th century, it takes as its subject the mythical tales of Oedipus Rex and Seven against Thebes.

It begins by introducing you to a young woman called Eleni (Aidini) who in the wilds of Odessa in 1919, lives in a small village of settlers populated by frugal but hard-working settlers. Intended in marriage to a much older man Spyros (there’s an age difference of approximately 40 years), its perhaps not surprising that she elopes with Spyros’s son Alexis (Poursadinis) who is Eleni’s age and also in love with her. They will head away from the village to a much larger town aided by musicians who would have played at the doomed wedding and this is just the beginning of a film that will end eventually in present-day New York.

It is something of a breakthrough for Angelopoulos or an act of bravery, since this is the first time for 35 years that he has made the pivotal figure in a film a woman again. He last did that in Reconstruction (1970). The Weeping Meadow though is also notable for its fine visuals. It simply looks marvellous in many of the shots, with a purity and pace that suits its wide-angle landscape views.

It isn’t going to be for everyone – many unused to this kind of filmmaking would probably head for a film that had greater pace and more humour but it has genuine authenticity, reasonable dialogue and fair performances – so it deserves to be seen on the arthouse circuit and not just by fans of the director’s earlier films. It feels like one of those epic stories like Once upon a time in America that will eventually find a point of significance that is all its own – you just have to be patient and see all the films to reach that point.

Matt Arnoldi