The Cannes Film Festival get Rosetta so the Femme Filmmakers Festival get Aria. The comparisons to the Dardennes’ Palme d’Or winning drama are clear as the Athenian sky. Myrsini Aristidou‘s short film, though focusing on a girl burdened somewhat by the adult world, is literally and figuratively many miles away from the Dardennes’ feature. Aristidou paints an organic portrait of the Greek harbor district, allowing us to dwell in those industrial surroundings. You can almost smell it. Theo Angelopoulos might’ve taken inspiration from this in another timeline.
Young actress Chryssa Platsatoura eats up scenery while hardly moving a muscle as Aria, a girl lumbered with a foreign visitor as well as the strains and responsibilities of a bleak landscape. Aristidou’s eager-eye camera loiters around Aria like a fly, it’s remarkable to practically breathe the same air. Aria is a beautifully down to Earth film, my personal favourite at the 3rd Femme Filmmakers Festival, where it won the Bronze Bell film prize, Directing and Female Performance.
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