“I am a child of Greek literature who makes cinema,” he summed up to himself. But Lakis Papastatis he leaves behind nothing but a multi-faceted work of films, books and the unrivaled public television show Behind the Scenes. Apart from his style, he also leaves an imprint of his spirit. “My generation didn’t produce great talent, but it did have a moral foundation when it embarked on a writing adventure to modernize our cinema. From the point of view of his ideal, the new Greek cinema has become a movement, not his films,” he said in an interview (“K”, 09/19/2010).

His death at the age of 79, after a short battle with cancer, brought together the voices of his friends from different artistic fields. Maybe because, as the artist says George Rorris, “can bring to life many of the skins that places, things, people have.” He was ready to come to him with paper and pencils to make a sketch after his portrait was completed in 2005. “I don’t know why he didn’t become an artist… Of course, he chose the art of painting. paintings… He spoke in his own way about John, Tsaruchis, Volanakis, the people he met and who left their mark on the face of today’s Greece. Lakis was a voter.”

Author and essayist Yannis Kiurtsakis adds that “for many of us it was part of our soul.” And about the director Catherine Evangelicouwho regards Lakis Papastatis as her teacher and their collaboration spans many decades, the mourning is unbearable. “Just one sentence. I will always think of him because of his aristocratic pride in such bad art. For his natural aversion to everything brilliant … He “smelled” the urn in art from afar.”

So this learned Greek film director, who followed the literary tradition of Papadiamantis, Viziinos and Mitsakis, as G. Kyurtzakis points out, had passion and passion, education, courage, honesty and sensitivity. He led, spoke and wrote with the same “commitment” of mind and soul. “I belong to the generation of new Greek cinema, which has made a great transition from subculture to art. We are not children of Finos or Sakellarios, but of Papadiamantis, Seferis, Elytis. We were lucky enough to film our admiration for another art, even more complex. The new Greek cinema was born with the stamp of difficulties,” he said in a 2010 interview with Dimitris Buras. He has just finished his fourth feature film Journey to Mytilene. He was preceded by multiple awards “Time of the Greeks” (1981), “Theophilus” (1987) and “The Only Life of a Taxi” (2001).

“When I first saw The Time of the Greeks, I immediately felt that this film, in addition to its obvious theme – the issue of robberies in Greece in the late 19th century, was a very personal cinematic poetic essay, a very original work of fiction. reflections on the division of the modern Greek world into its urban and mass culture,” notes G. Kiurtsakis, who also published an essay analysis of the cinema by L. Papastatis.

It is no coincidence that he was an assistant to Alexis Damianos in Evdokia (1971), and the friendship that bound them did not break over time. In 1972, he made his first short film Letters from America, which shows the aesthetic influence of Damianos. He started the legendary show “Behind the Scenes” in February 1976 with Takis Hatsopoulos. In just 40 or so years, 900 performances were shown.

“He had his own way of talking about Ioannou, Tsarouchis, Volanakis, people he met and who left their mark on today’s Greece,” says J. Rorris.

In the 1970s, he collaborated with the Free Theatre, making short films for its performances. It was also there that he met his later wife, the actress Yvonne Maltezu (with whom they had a son, the journalist Argyris Papastati). A separate chapter of his life was also his close friendship and collaboration with Dionysius Savvopoulos.

In addition to the book about “Eudokia” (2006, ed. Pataky), he wrote four collections of short stories: “The Bat Has Flew”, “Quiet and Other Stories”, “Summer Will Play Clytemnestra” and the teacher loved silent films.

Loaded Heroes

Myth and history, folk readings, literary outsiders, art critics, problematic and gifted people turned into Lakis Papastati’s film compositions into personalities with symbolic and real charges. The artist Theophilus, the writer Vizinos became the bearers of “Greekness” with strong roots in traditions. The nineteenth century nurtured him more than any other. He was, of course, not interested in biographies, but in following his heroes in their inner wanderings, in search of the identity of his (new) Greek face.

“The image of Theophilus for me is like an actor who, playing in a heroic play, leaves the stage and takes to the streets, taking with him not only clothes, but also the soul of his role,” he wrote in “K” (“Seven Days”) “He lives in the world of his art every day. He wears the uniform of the characters he paints, as if he were protecting them. ” Exactly what Lakis Papastatis did.

His funeral will take place tomorrow Friday at 11:15 am at Byron Cemetery.