62nd THESSALONIKI INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL
4-14/11/2021
Carte Blanche Yorgos Mavropsaridis: Screening of the film My American Uncle by Alain Resnais
On Friday 12 November, at Makedonikon cinema, the film My American Uncle by Alain Resnais was screened, as part of the carte blanche given by the 62nd Thessaloniki IFF to Yorgos Mavropsaridis, distinguished guest of the tribute “In the Cut: Editing and its Secrets” hosted by the 62nd TIFF. Yorgos Mavropsaridis raised the curtain of the event by saying the following: “I would like to explain the influence this film had on me. I watched it in 1980, at Pallas cinema in Athens. The reason I chose it is because I immediately connected it with the editing process that refers to the present of the viewer who watches the screen, in the sense that we create the present in our own mind”.
As he stated, “there is the element of the present, which dominates the film, but there is also everything we learn when we’re at a young age. There are stereotypes, some things we learn and are affected by our past, while the present is many times also based on fantasy. The film is supposed to develop the theories of behavioral psychology; we observe a scientist who tries to interpret the events, but nothing works as an explanation of these positions. The film is a fruitful combination of three different characters, whom we observe through their course of life. How they grow older, which are their values, how our ethics are developed in the future depending on our organic disposition towards the environment. The film also refers to the tendency of escaping or fighting, as well as to the stress generated out of thin air. As I said before, the film doesn’t work as a proof of these positions. In contrast, it is an effective confrontation and as we are approaching the end, all the in-between and the explanations are slowly fading away. The final scene confirms not what we know, but what we don’t know”, Mr. Mavropsaridis stated.
As he pointed out, “Resnais’ view of the film is that he wants to give the viewer the freedom to interpret the film, which is very important because each explanation we give -just like each one of you do tonight- has an impact on how we understand and how we get to know ourselves and the world. I hope that when the film ends, it will reveal something about yourselves, like it did for me the first time I watched it. I rewatch it quite often, because it is very modern and fresh, even if it was shot 40 years ago”, Mr. Mavropsaridis said and concluded his presentation on the film.
