Saturday, 09 October 2021 13:00

First Line, The/ Promakhos






THE FIRST LINE/ PROMAKHOS

US/Greece/UK, 2014, 90 minutes, Colour.
Pantelis Kodogiannis, Kassandra Voyagis, Giancarlo Giannini, Paul Freeman, Georges Corraface, Michael Byrne, Yorgo Voyagis.
Directed by Coerte Voorhees, John Vorhees.

The First Line has quite a cultural background. The writers and directors are two Americans with Dutch background. They have taken up the cause of the Parthenon Marbles, the so-called Elgin Marbles in the British Museum since the beginning of the 19th century. While the court cases in this dramatisation are fiction, the dispute between Britain and Greece is very real, Greece claiming the Marbles should be returned to Athens.

As a drama, the film is not particularly effective, ranging back and forth from Greece to Britain, personal stories of the Greek defender and his love interest, the British lawyers and curators and their colonial attitudes, the development of political parties in 21st-century Greece, The First Line and their machinations and politicking.

However, the film serves as raising the issues, putting the point of view of the Greeks, Paul Freeman and Michael Byrne rather supercilious as the Britons, the fact that the issues are still present but unresolved.

1. The title? The background of Greek politics in the 21st-century? The political party, politicians, political in? The issue of the Parthenon Marbles?

2. The settings in Athens, the views of the Acropolis, the Parthenon, tourists, students, the Museum, the authorities? The city streets and atmosphere? Official buildings and offices? The contrast with Britain, the British Museum, the courts? The American background of the lawyer? The musical score?

3. The issue of the Parthenon marbles, the Elgin marbles? Historical explanations? British colonialism in the 19th century? The ruins of the Acropolis, the taking of the marbles to London? British rights? The issue of the Ottoman Empire and permissions? Colonial superiority – continuing with the current guardians and looking down on the Greeks?

4. The fictitious court cases? Dramatising the current issues? How persuasive? The film as propaganda? For the Greeks? The British point of view?

5. The structure of the film, a variety of pieces and jigsaw? The dramatic effect? Or not?

6. The lawyer, his background, being in the United States, his love for his co-worker? The decision to participate in the court cases? Their work together? The Greek ethos, the invocation of Athena and quotes from Pericles? The determination? The effect on their lives?

7. The hearings, the Greek point of view and strength of arguments? The response of the British lawyer, his assertions? The background of the curator, his age, experience, his supercilious judgements about the Greeks? The judges, the decision of the museums to argue the issue, the disappointment? Going to further courts? The dispute about the
authorisation from the Ottoman Empire?

8. The human stories, the lawyers, the British, the ship owner and his interventions and its being rejected?

9. The film as a useful presentation of the legal, cultural, political issues concerning the Marbles?

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