Beyond Borders
10th Kastellorizo International
Documentary Festival

Thespis, the first actor in Greek drama, traveled from city to city with a cart that transformed into an improvised stage, offering audiences the very first theatrical experience in human history. Thus was born theatre—the art of dramaturgy that shaped, and continues to shape, global storytelling by giving form to human experiences, passions and anxieties. Greece, the Country of Honor of the 10th edition of Beyond Borders | Kastellorizo International Documentary Festival, was the cradle of theatrical practice and narrative art, spanning from antiquity to the dawn of cinema and continues to inspire and contribute to the art of film and storytelling worldwide.

From the tragedies of Euripides and Sophocles, which portrayed the human condition with timeless precision, to the bold comedies of Aristophanes, whose fearless satire captured the political and social dead-ends of their time, Greek narrative has always transcended borders, eras and formats. The first cinematic document of the Balkans, The Weavers by the Manaki Brothers (1905), recorded daily life with disarming simplicity. From there, Greece’s journey toward a national cinema began—initially shaped through pastoral themes and early “fustanella” productions, eventually forming a unique cinematic identity alongside the emergence of film itself.

The postwar years saw the flourishing of popular dramas, comedies and musicals led by industry pioneer Filopimin Finos, who guided Greek cinema as a cultural balm in the wake of wartime devastation. By the late 1950s and early 1960s, Greece had entered the international stage, with major co-productions and acclaimed creators like Michael Cacoyannis and Nikos Koundouros giving voice to the Greek cinematic vision. This path, however, was never linear—it was filled with contradictions, upheavals and a persistent creative spark.
The 1970s ushered in the New Greek Cinema, bringing political critique and radical resistance to the fore. This movement, deeply influenced by the anti-dictatorship intellectual discourse of the time, redefined global cinematic aesthetics through visionary auteurs such as Theodoros Angelopoulos and Pantelis Voulgaris, among others.

Following a period of decline in production and audience interest, Greek cinema began to rebound toward the end of the 20th century. A pivotal moment came with the emergence of the Greek Weird Wave in the late 2000s, against the backdrop of economic collapse. With its modern poetic language and symbolic abstraction, this movement bridged the personal with the collective, giving voice to a generation’s anxieties, memories, dreams and disillusionments. Today, contemporary Greek cinema continues its timeless journey—narrating intimate and universal human stories with sensitivity and boldness. A new generation of filmmakers, coupled with growing international recognition, positions Greece to claim its rightful place on the global cinematic map.

In its 10th anniversary edition, Beyond Borders celebrates this enduring creative path with a special tribute to Greek filmmakers and the evolution of Greek documentary—a cinematic form that confronts reality, interprets it, comments on it, and reshapes it in the most imaginative and immediate ways.
On the island of Kastellorizo—a symbolic site of historical memory and cultural convergence—the art of storytelling continues its tireless voyage. In a world that often seems to shrink, Beyond Borders remains committed to expanding horizons. Through its films, it embraces one of the most challenging yet human missions of all: the discovery of humanity, wherever it resides and wherever it comes from.

The Festival’s new visual identity, designed by the creative studio Polkadot Design, draws inspiration from the art of weaving—a practice symbolizing memory, narration and continuity. Just as the women weavers of 1905, protagonists of the first cinematic recording in the Balkans, wove their present through craft, today’s documentary filmmakers weave reality through image and sound. Greek documentary becomes a cinematic loom, where past and present are tightly interlaced, forming a narrative tapestry that extends into the future.