How to shoot a ghost

Two newly dead young people meet in the streets of Athens, amid the pulsing cityscape and the ghosts of history. One a translator, the other a photographer, they were outsiders in life; in death they struggle with the residue of their longings and mistakes. They wander the city together, finding consolation in the difficult beauty of existence and its aftermath.

Following two recently dead people who wander Athens as ghosts, the film explores mortality: as it interacts with the urge toward belonging, and our human desire to leave something, some trace, behind; and our twin desire for selfobliteration. Street photography, historical footage, and old home videos interlaced with the body of the film, underscore how the “now” will become the “then”, how those of us living today become the ghosts of tomorrow. Athens, a city in which the bones of history are always on display — whether it’s living scars from the dictatorship of the 1970s, or the presence of monuments that stood at the time of the plague of two thousand years ago — is the perfect place to explore the tangle of past and present, how the policies and longings of the dead go on living within us. What does it mean to let go, to say goodbye; to move through time, through life without clinging to it? As ghosts, Anthi and Rateb occupy a liminal space. Both had struggled with difficult relationships in life and now as they try to understand their current situation, the echoes of those struggles persist. It mattered in life that they were outsiders — for reasons of culture, sexuality, temperament — but in death they learn it doesn’t. The identities and relationships that seemed so crucial have evaporated, along with much of what they had understood to be important. So, what’s left? These were their lives. This is what happened to them. It doesn’t need to be fixed, because it can’t be fixed. It is enough. For me, this is a powerful way of experiencing the world: to be present, keep looking, keep experiencing, without the need to hoard one’s experiences in a kind of scrapbook that we will never be able to go back and read. I think of all the photographs we all seem to have now, thousands and thousands of frozen moments that none of us will be taking with us when we go. As our ghosts explore the world from the other side of the divide, their gaze is both more forgiving and more austere. With a certain wrenching sadness, they come to an understanding, and with that understanding comes freedom. They’re at last able to embrace the coming adventure, the mystery toward which all of us are headed.

PRODUCTION 1:
Unmade
235 Park Ave S. Fl. 9
10003 New York, United States of America
Tel: +1 5516557525‬
E-mail: anthony@antipop.com

PRODUCTION 2:
Soft Focus Films - Isabelle Deluce
120 Shoreline Circle
V3H5B3 Port Moody, Canada
Tel: +1 6049103494
E-mail: isabelledeluce@gmail.com

PRODUCTION 3:
Monarch Kaleidoscope – Emily McCann Lesser
310 E 25th St Apt 1D
11226 Brooklyn, United States of America
Tel: +1 9175739538‬
E-mail: emily@monarchkaleidoscope.com
Web: http://www.MonarchKaleidoscope.com/
Social Media: https://www.facebook.com/monarch.kaleidoscope/ - Facebook, https://www.instagram.com/monarch.kaleidoscope/ - Instagram

PRODUCTION 4:
Green Olive Films - Simos Manganis
2 Megalou Alexandrou Street
16674 Glyfada, Greece
Tel: +30 2106897241
E-mail: simos@greenolivefilms.com
Web: http://www.greenolivefilms.com/
Social Media: https://www.instagram.com/greenolivefilms/; Instagram, https://www.facebook.com/greenolivefilms/ - Facebook

PRODUCTION 5:
Kanopy World Headquarters - One OverDrive Way
44125 Cleveland, Ohio, United States of America Web: https://www.kanopy.com

OTHER PRODUCTIONS:
Liaison Pictures;
Nightjar Films

WORLD SALES:
Kanopy World Headquarters - One OverDrive Way
44125 Cleveland, Ohio, United States of America Web: https://www.kanopy.com

PRESS OFFICE:
Nicole Kerr - Kerr Communications
132 Yale Avenue, 324
07304 Jersey City, United States of America
Tel: 7065773287
E-mail: nicole@nkerrcommunications.com