LOOKING FOR IOANNIS VARVAKIS - GENOCIDE OF MEMORY
A Press Conference was held on Friday, March 19, 2010 during the 12th Thessaloniki Documentary Festival - Images of the 21st Century by the directors Yannis Smaragdis (Looking For Ioannis Varvakis) and Andonis Papadopoulos (Genocide of Memory). Also present were Kostas Dimos, collaborator of Smaragdis and ERT representative – both films are ERT co-productions – and Dimitris Tzanas, graduate of the Varvakeion school, who inspired the director to search for Varvakis through the valuable information he gave.
The two directors differed in their approach. Smaragdis rediscovered the joy of creation, especially during the edititing process, as he said. “I questioned things such as what is a creative person. I don’t know if what Kazantzakis says is true in my case, that I became a child from the edge of the sea”. Andonis Papadopoulos recalled painful family memories, after admitting that the child who lived through his father’s death during the occupation famine (the subject of his film), was actually his own father. Obviously moved, he explained: “I went into my material through one gate and came out another, into something completely new. This process was endless”. He said he could make a sequel based on the new material that keeps appearing , and that he has made a longer version of his film including a further 20 minutes of material. Smaragdis, speaking about his internal involvement with the making of his film said: “I went into the story of Ioannis Varvakis with questions and came out with certainties”.
