The director lists the five films that shaped him
In the mid-1990s. Film School, Department of Directing, Athens. Back then, we didn’t just watch movies to pass a class. We watched them as if something very serious depended on them—perhaps even our very lives. We’d sit for hours in dark theaters or rent videotapes from the neighborhood cinephile video club. We discovered directors, discussed the same scenes over and over again, and argued about a single shot or an entire sequence.
From then on, I began watching movies obsessively.
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Over the years, I’ve journeyed through the entire history of cinema: from the silent images of Georges Méliès, who realized very early on that cinema could be both storytelling, a dream, and a magic trick all at once, all the way to Christopher Nolan’s *Odyssey* in IMAX.
Along the way, I’ve directed many hours of fiction for television, but not a single feature film for the big screen. That remains my great unfulfilled dream. I’m not saying this as a complaint, but more as an unfinished business that continues to follow me—and reminds me that certain dreams, no matter how many years go by, have no expiration date.
So choosing just five films is almost agonizing. They aren’t necessarily the best films ever made, nor are they the most technically accomplished of those I’ve seen. They are the ones I encountered at just the right moment and that, for various reasons, left a mark on me.
FARGO
1996, directed by the Coen Brothers.
The film won the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay. It’s a masterclass in screenwriting—we’ve dissected its structure minute by minute in film school. It has a three-act structure, but the Coens break several basic rules of classical storytelling without the story ever losing its tension or coherence. And that’s what makes it so important.
And back then, as a student, that was like a small revelation. The Coen brothers showed me that a great film needs neither a grand theme nor a conventional hero. You could introduce your leading lady after the first half-hour, blend humor with violence and tragedy with everyday life—as long as you knew why you were breaking the rules. Above all, I realized that even a small story, set in a remote and unique place, could become universal.
STELLA
1955, directed by Michalis Kakogiannis
“Stella, go away, I’m holding a knife!” Who doesn’t know that line? Stella or Melina Merkouri? Two names forever linked to a single heroine. And behind her stands Michalis Kakogiannis, the Cypriot director who created one of the most legendary films in Greek cinema.
I’ve seen it many times and still find myself returning to it. Each time, I marvel anew at his directorial vision: the way he films the faces, the working-class neighborhoods, nightclubs, and an Athens brimming with tension, music, and passion. He doesn’t flaunt his direction; he lets it serve the characters and lead us, almost imperceptibly, toward the inevitable ending. As a Cypriot director myself, I feel something extra when I think about who is behind this film. And then there’s Melina. She doesn’t play Stella; she becomes Stella. She acts without fear, without trying to make her likable. There’s an authenticity that transcends technique, and that’s why her performance remains vivid. For me, “Stella” is a modern tragedy about a woman who refuses to submit. She makes no apologies for her desires and defends her right to choose until the very end.
Perhaps that’s why I keep watching it. Because every time, it brings me back to the same question: how high a price does one—and especially a woman—pay to remain free?
ALL ABOUT MY MOTHER
1999, directed by Pedro Almodóvar.
*All About My Mother* is a film that has left a deep mark on me as a director. Pedro Almodóvar was already my favorite filmmaker, but with this film I felt he had reached the most mature point in his career. He retained the vivid colors, melodrama, humor, and eccentricity of his world, but blended them with an unprecedented tenderness and emotional maturity. It was no coincidence that the film won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film.
I was moved by the way Almodóvar spoke about motherhood, loss, identity, and people’s need to be reborn through their wounds. Above all, however, I admired the way he directed his actresses. The women in the film are strong and vulnerable, funny and tragic, real and yet larger than life. Each carries her own story, but together they form a unique family.
The film constantly dialogues with works that I, too, have loved: *All About Eve*, *A Streetcar Named Desire*, and John Cassavetes’ *Opening Night*. Almodóvar doesn’t copy them; he incorporates them into his own world and creates something entirely personal. Theater and cinema converge, the actors blur the line between their roles and real life, and life itself is transformed back into a performance.
Years later, when the film was adapted into a play and staged in London, I felt the desire to bring it to the Cypriot stage as well. I sent my directorial proposal to Almodóvar himself and received his positive response almost immediately. His consent was a moment of great joy for me, but also one of great responsibility. I wasn’t simply called upon to stage a play; I was called upon to creatively engage with a cinematic world that had decisively shaped my own perspective.
So I directed *All About My Mother* in Cyprus with a large cast, bringing the women, the passions, and the cinematic references of the play to the stage. It was one of those rare moments when the audience member who had once been moved by a film met the director he later became. For me, then, *All About My Mother* is not just a favorite movie. It is a part of my personal and artistic journey.
PSYCHO
1960, directed by Alfred Hitchcock
*Psycho* and Alfred Hitchcock are linked to one of the most significant moments in my own career. When I took the exams at the Greek Ministry of Culture to obtain my license to practice as a film director, Hitchcock was one of the key topics. I didn’t just have to know his films. I had to understand the way he thought and built suspense.
For me, *Psycho* remains an unparalleled masterclass in filmmaking. Hitchcock dares to do something that seemed unthinkable: around the 45-minute mark, he kills Marion Crane, the heroine whom, up until that point, we believed we would follow all the way to the end. And he doesn’t just kill a character. He kills his leading lady, played by none other than the film’s biggest star, Janet Leigh.
That’s where the big twist comes in. Suddenly, we lose the character we’d identified with, and the movie seems to start all over again. As a viewer, I feel that from that moment on, anything can happen. No one is safe, and none of the rules I had known up to that point can be taken for granted anymore.
Hitchcock was the great master of suspense, but for me he was above all the director who left nothing to chance. He planned his film on paper, shot by shot, before he even began shooting. The camera angle, the duration of a gaze, the editing rhythm, the sound, the silence—everything was designed to evoke a specific emotion in the viewer
GOODFELLAS
1990, directed by Martin Scorsese
For me, *Goodfellas* is a never-ending lesson in filmmaking. No matter how many times I return to the film, I rediscover the energy, precision, and freedom with which Martin Scorsese tells his story.
Scorsese doesn’t just show us the lives of gangsters. He immerses us in their world and lets us first feel its allure before revealing its violence, its madness, and its inevitable collapse. The camera never stops; Thelma Schoonmaker’s editing follows the characters’ feverish pace; the songs comment on each era; and the voice-over keeps us constantly inside Henry Hill’s mind.
The scene that continues to captivate me is the famous three-minute single take at the Copacabana. Henry leads Karen from the back entrance, through hallways, up stairs, and through the kitchen, all the way to the packed dance floor of the club. Everyone knows him, everyone greets him, and as soon as he reaches the front of the stage, a table appears almost out of nowhere.
What I find even more instructive is that the single take wasn’t conceived as a display of directorial virtuosity. It arose from a practical problem: the crew couldn’t use the main entrance of the actual club. Scorsese, however, did not view this limitation as an obstacle. He turned it into the central narrative concept of the entire scene.
Steadicam operator Larry McConkey moved backward through narrow corridors, while the camera, the actors, and dozens of extras had to be perfectly synchronized. It took eight takes. The hardest part wasn’t just the lead actors’ movements, but coordinating the entire set. If the table appeared a second too early or an extra lost their position, the entire take had to start over. Even a slight shake of the camera—which the cameraman feared had ruined the shot—Scorsese kept in the final cut because it made the moment feel more alive.
And above it all, “Then He Kissed Me” by The Crystals plays. An innocent, sweet pop song accompanies a criminal’s journey. Because in reality, the scene isn’t just about Henry. It’s mainly about Karen. The camera becomes her gaze.
