Feature film (1h 23min). Written by Youla Boudali & Syllas Tzoumerkas, directed by Syllas Tzoumerkas.
Watch the trailer HERE (Dutch visitors can buy the film HERE).
Maria is running away on the highway. She is alone in her roaring SUV. Behind her, fire and a case full of money. In front of her, the hopeless vastness of the motorway. Her crazy, accelerating course will stop at nothing. Only a day before she was a caring mother, a loving wife, a responsible daughter. Today she has gone rogue: she is determined to sweep away everything she has ever cared for.
Maria’s tragic tale of ascent to redemption is narrated through bits of the present that become tangibly interwoven with fragments of the past, creating a dazzling and devastating mural of contemporary Greece. Behind the eternal reign of her average Greek family, lie only wrongly asserted sexuality, lies and debts, which can only be exposed by a blast.
Violent as much as honest, A Blast follows uncompromisingly its anti-heroine, as she desperately reclaims the life taken away from her by an envious mother, a mentally challenged but all demanding sister, an absent husband and a hostile country. The comic goes hand in hand with the tragic and a hidden tenderness constantly counterparts the atrocious reality in a Greek tale that is more timely than ever.
Official website A Blast (including stills and presskit)
Year: 2014
Written by: Youla Boudali & Syllas Tzoumerkas
Directed by: Syllas Tzoumerkas
Producers: Maria Drandaki, Titus Kreyenberg, Ellen Havenith, Jeroen Beker
Distributor NL: Wild Bunch Benelux
Supported by: Greek Film Centre, Nipkow Programm, NRW, Netherlands Film Fund
In co-production with: Homemade Films (GR), unafilm (DE), Bastide Films (NL)
In collaboration with: ZDF/Arte
Selected for: 67th Locarno IFF 2014 – Conscorso Internazionale (world premiere), 20th Sarajevo IFF 2014 – International Competition (regional premiere), 20th Athens Film Festival (national premiere), 44th Rotterdam International Film Festival 2015 – Limelight, BFI London Film Festival 2014 – DARE, 50th Karlovy Vary IFF 2015 – Critics’ Choice: Variety’s 10 Directors to Watch, Hamburg Film Festival 2014 – Free port, American Film Institute (AFI) – European Film Showcase 2015, Seattle International Film Festival 2015 – New Directors Competition, Kaunas International Film Festival 2014 – Main Programme, 12th International Film Festival TOFIFEST, Toruń 2014 – International Competition, 8th All About Freedom IFF 2014, Gdansk, 21st Greek Film Festival 2014, Melbourne, Sydney, 38th São Paulo International Film Festival – Competição Novos Diretores, 55th Thessaloniki Film Festival – 100 years of Greek cinema (2014), 20th Kolkata IFF – International Cinema, Festival de Cinéma Européen des Arcs – Panorama, POFF – Tallinn, Black Nights IFF – Panorama, Exground Filmfest, Wiesbaden – International, Luxembourg City Film Festival – International Competition 2015, 7th Larissa International Film Festival 2015, Lichter Filmfest, Frankfurt 2015, 39th Hong Kong International Film Festival 2015, 8eme Panorama du cinéma grec contemporain, 33 Festival Cinematografico Internacional del Uruguay, Montevideo 2015, 34th Istanbul International Film Festival – New Directors, 16th JeonJu International Film Festival 2015 – Greek New Wave tribute, Cyprus Film Days International Film Festival 2015 – International Competition, Crossing Europe International Film Festival 2015 – Linz, Rome Independent Film Festival 2015 – Opening Film, 17th Taipei International Film Festival– Future Lights, 15th New Horizons International Film Festival 2015 – Panorama, Malans International Film Festival 2015, 25th Montenegro International Film Festival 2015, Espoo Ciné International Film Festival 2015, Marfa International Film Festival 2015 – Texas, USA, Haifa International Film Festival 2015, Otranto Film Fund Festival – Critic’s prize, 21st Athens International Film Festival – Best Debut by an Actress Award (Maria Filini), 14th Cinedays International Film Festival 2015 – Skopje, 10th Muces/ Muestra de Cinema Europeo 2015 – Ciudad de Segovia, 29. Griechischen Filmwoche 2015 – Munich, 26th Ljubljana International Film Festival 2015 – Panorama, This Human World 2015 – International Human Rights Festival Vienna, PRIFEST International Film Festival PristinaKosovo 2016 – FIPRESCI Jury Prize. Winner of: Eurimages Co-production Development Award @ CineLink 2012, FIPRESCI Jury Prize @ PRIFEST International Film Festival Pristina Kosovo, Best Debut by an Actress Award for Maria Filini @ 21st Athens International Film Festival, Critic’s prize @ Otranto Film Fund Festival.
