VOYAGE TO CYTHERA



Greece-West Germany-Italy-UK, 1983, 137 min, color

Cythera, in Greek mythology, is the isle of dreams where one can dedicate oneself to happiness (of the pursuit thereof). In this quest within a quest, the tale of the father's return is told as if from the point of view of his son Telemachus and as if Telemachus were a filmmaker, as well as a middle-aged man with a son of his own. A film director, tired of the illusions and fictions of his profession, searches for a story of substance by attaching himself to an old man, a recently returned political exile. The man, away in the Soviet Union for 32 years and now stateless, finds himself at the beginning of a journey, not the end, and Angelopoulos evokes the past, present and future to bridge the gap between reality and the imagination. It is a journey to the dark side of Greek history, where it crosses paths with myth.

"In Voyage to Cythera the voyage is really a reworking of the myth of the Return of Odysseus, according to a myth which preceded Homer. Similar to Dante's version, there is a pre-Homeric version that Odysseus set sail again after reaching Ithaca. So the film becomes more a leaving than a homecoming."