Video review

Waimarino Bulletin, Volume 5, Issue 1, 3 June 1987, Page 6

Video review

"Eleni" is a true and powerful story about civil war, motherhood and revenge. It is the story of a mother who gives everything fcr her children, and her son who seeks revenge for her murder. Kate Nelligan plays the part of Eleni, a Greek peasant woman during the Greek civil war of the late 1940's, when the country was being fought over by those loyal to the Crown and the communists. She is loyal to no-one but her children. She does everything to protect and feed them and when the communists try to take them away from her, to be sent to Albania and Czechoslovakia, she tries to escape to America with them to be with her husband. Her son Nicholas Gage, played by John Malkovich, becomes a reporter for the New York Times. Thirty years after his mother's death he leaves his wife and children behind to go to Athens for the newspaper. There he tries to uncover her story and to find the man responsible for her death. The two stories are told simultaneously, with cuts from the war to the present and back at carefully chosen moments. It is not difficult to follow both story lines as they are both simple tales, though it may be hard to understand the reasons behind the war. The film is about children and shows them as the greatest sufferers in a war, especially a savage, civil war where the enemy are familiar, even old friends or family. Children come into Nick's story also. When he is faced with his mother's murderer and his own need for revenge a child complicates the issue for him. "Eleni" makes compelling viewing, it is an unforgettable story, you should see it. "Eleni" is available on video in the Waimarino at Video Point Ohakune and Raetihi.