SUNTAN

Greece, 2016, 104 minutes, Colour.
Efthymis Papadimitriou, Elli Triggou.
Directed by Argyris Papadimitropoulos.

The focus of this film is a 42-year-old doctor, Kostis, who has taken up a position as resident doctor on the Aegean island of Anaparis. He is welcomed by the Mayor and finds that he has many patients and is kept very busy. There is no explanation of what had happened to him before this appointment but he gives the impression that he has had hard times and, perhaps, is escaping his past.

However, things change with the coming of summer and to the coming of the tourists.

After showing the initial work of the doctor and his rapport with his patients, the film veers into hedonistic mode especially with a group of young tourists. The doctor befriends them when one of them has suffered an accident with a bike and has a gash on her leg. He is encouraged to go down to the beach, sees several of them swimming nude and sunbaking nude and is attracted and intrigued. They continue to befriend him.

While there is a lot of suntan, there is also a lot of hedonistic behaviour, on the beach, at nightclubs. The group seems to be carefree and rather sexually permissive.

The doctor seeks out their company, goes early from his practice, to the criticism of the locals, to be on the beach. Some of the locals make frequent lewd remarks about the availability of the women.

What happens is that the doctor becomes obsessed with the girl he treated at his practice. She is very cheerful with him, seeming to lead him on, even to a sexual encounter. It means far more to him than to her. In fact, he becomes completely obsessed, following the group, experiencing their mockery, their going off on a tour for several days without letting him know, his confronting the girl, her telling him off, her later mellowing in her response but urging him that the relationship has no future.

With these significant themes and a telling portrait from the actor bringing the doctor to life, the film suddenly stops. Dramatically, this is something of a letdown – but, of course, it means that the audience has to imagine and speculate about the doctor’s future, especially as he has disgraced himself in the eyes of the people on the island and the mayor and has to leave.