10th Beyond Borders Festival: A First Look at the Opening Days

A Dynamic Start for the Opening Days of the 10th Beyond Borders!

Films that reveal the human capacity for both greatness and darkness, activities for all ages, filmmaking workshops, co-production forums, musical performances, book and institution presentations — all have transformed the remote island of Kastellorizo into an open, beautiful, and creative platform of connection, where audiences and creators exchange ideas, coexist, engage in dialogue, and create — quite literally on the waterfront.

The Strategic Partner of Beyond Borders is PPC (Public Power Corporation S.A.), the leading energy company in Southeastern Europe, actively supporting arts and culture. As an integral part of the country’s social and economic fabric, PPC fosters dialogue with culture and the arts, supporting all those who lead us into the future — a better future for all, with culture at its very core.

The opening weekend featured screenings from the Main Competition Section, which includes a total of 18 feature- and mid-length documentaries, as well as from the non-competitive Panorama Section, all open to the public with free admission on the stunning island of Kastellorizo. It is worth noting that, out of the 42 films competing this year, 35 are having their Greek, international, or world premiere, while many of them have already traveled to the world’s most prestigious film festivals.

One highlight was Welcome to Babel by Australian director James Bradley, which unfolds the moving story of Chinese artist Shen, who devoted his life to creating a monumental mural that captures the history of communism, as he and his wife experienced it during Mao’s Cultural Revolution. The director shared with the audience his personal acquaintance with Shen and the challenges of filming this 12-year-long project. Particularly striking were the sequences from the Tiananmen Square protests, which, as Bradley noted, remain deeply controversial — treated in China as if they had never happened. He further stressed that today’s true enemy is not necessarily communism or capitalism, but authoritarianism, as it manifests even in countries such as the United States.

Equally memorable was On Melting Snow by Mojtaba Bahadori, an arthouse film that traces the artistic creation of Sophie Cauvin through a poetic journey into the landscapes and geological treasures of volcanic Iceland, accompanied by therapeutic soundscapes. Speaking with the audience, the director explained that his academic background has long connected him to films about rocks and geology, while the text featured in the film draws inspiration from the poetry of Jalaluddin Rumi.

Particular emotion was stirred by the Iranian film The Lost Season by Mehdi Ghanavati, where we follow young Kosar, living in a poor, arid village on the Iran–Afghanistan border. Forced into marriage by her grandfather and father, she watches her dreams of education fade under the demands of her new life: caring for her husband, her home, and later her child. “Life could have been more beautiful,” she reflects, mourning what she never had the chance to do. “My dreams are fading. I live a life of indifference, sinking into the mire that drags me down. We are the generation of lost dreams,” she concludes, with bitterness.

On the second day, audiences were also moved by Lo by Thanasis Vassiliou, who, a year after his mother’s death, returns to his childhood apartment to confront a troubled inheritance and the fragmented memories of his family, weaving his personal story with the collective trauma of the Greek Junta. Night Recedes by Timos Koulmasis portrays artists Memo and Zizi Makris, who lived through the Occupation, exile, and the Cold War, with art as their testimony and compass, evoking the lost utopias of their generation. Meanwhile, To Use a Mountain by Casey Carter focuses on the resistance of six rural communities in the U.S. threatened with becoming nuclear waste disposal sites.

Between screenings, the Main Competition stage was transformed into a musical platform with interludes by the Athens String Quartet, featuring musicians of the Athens State Orchestra: violinists Apollon Grammatikopoulos and Panagiotis Tziotis, violist Angela Giannaki, and cellist Isidoros Sideris.

In the Panorama Section, a packed screening of Rules of Stone by Danae Elon made a strong impression, addressing the silent violence of Israeli colonization in Jerusalem through the testimonies of architects. Behind the aesthetics of chiseled stone — legally required to come from the city — lies a systematic process of displacement, exclusion, and erasure, particularly after the 1967 war. The film referenced the Nakba (Palestinian Catastrophe), during which hundreds of Palestinian villages were destroyed to build Israeli towns, while Arab residents of Jerusalem were forced to demolish their own homes. Questions were posed to the director by Palestinian student Wael Abboud. Elon, a Canadian of Israeli descent who grew up in Jerusalem, described the city as the “capital of Israeli apartheid” and emphasized that, until 1948, all communities there lived harmoniously. “When I made the film, I could never have imagined that 80% of Gaza would be destroyed today,” she said. “Just today, 75 people were killed and another three died of hunger, while thousands protest to stop the genocide.”

In The Man Who Told the Truth by Mal Marken, the audience follows the trail of Charles Thomson, U.S. Founding Father who fought for Indigenous rights, the abolition of slavery, and independence. Journalist and author Bruce Clark, an active advocate for the return of the Parthenon Marbles to Greece, who grew up in the same place as Thomson, highlights among other things the influence of his Greek education on his political vision.

A full house also greeted the screening of Kastellorizo: An Island in the Heart of the Worldby Ivan Butel, in which islanders of all ages shared the joys, struggles, and challenges of life on this remote island of 250 residents, with an equal military presence, where most people live off tourism. Kastellorizo also serves as inspiration for the Beyond Storytelling project, filming Mediterraneo’s legendary actor Giuseppe Cederna and sculptor Alexandros Zygouris on the island today, capturing moments of creation and the sense of belonging in an era of dramatic change, tourism-driven transformation, and constant mobility.

In Uberto Primoby Alessandra Maioletti, the story is told of nine Jewish students of the eponymous school in Nazi-occupied Thessaloniki, who left behind their dreams to fight for survival. Finally, Yiannis Spanos: Behind the Marquee by Aris Dorizas traces the musical journey of the great composer, from Kiato to Paris and back to the heart of Greek music, through rare archival material and the testimonies of leading artists such as Savvopoulos, Plessas, Mitsias, Dalaras, Delivorias, Violari, among others. “I cannot make music with too many people around — I love solitude,” Spanos says in one excerpt, adding that the song that best describes him is Lonely People.

From early morning, the welcoming Town Hall and the picturesque covered Market of the island filled with children attending screenings from the Chania Film Festival and participating in chess lessons for all ages, organized by the Rhodes Chess Club “Knight” with the support of two chess SenseRobots. On Tuesday, the island was also delighted by the spectacular arrival of stilt-walker Neil Adrian Blakemore, whose acrobatics captivated both children and adults alike.

The Co-Production Forum is now in its second year of a promising journey, bringing together distinguished directors and producers from Greece and abroad to share ideas, expertise, experiences, and practices, with the aim of strengthening the documentary sector through collaboration and co-production. In the two sessions held so far, 10 projects have been presented from Greece, as well as from Iran, Australia, and Canada, with the fruits of this process expected to emerge very soon.

Of special interest was the presentation of the book Kastellorizo by Athina Tarsouli, part of her volume on the Dodecanese, edited and published by IDISME. In her foreword, Irini Sarioglou, President of the Festival, emphasized that the book preserves important elements of the island’s identity that must endure, noting that while much has changed, the love of the Kastellorizians for their homeland remains unchanged. The author — a poet, writer, and painter — created the drawings that accompany the work 75 years ago. Writer and journalist Pavlos Methenitis, who presented the book and read evocative passages, highlighted: “The book speaks of people lost in the passage of time, of customs, traditions, architecture, costumes, and dialect. It plunges us into the collective soul of the island, which the author has preserved in a work of documentation that reads like a novel.”

During the presentation, Sarioglou, President of the Festival, also referred to the once-prestigious newspaper published on the island, to the Ottoman archives containing extensive volumes on Megisti — which still need to be translated and published — and to a valuable Kastellorizo archive recently donated to IDISME by a lawyer and collector. Among its findings, the archive confirms that the devastating fire which destroyed much of the island after World War II was in fact caused by the British Allies.

On Tuesday afternoon, a special event was held to present the Creative Greece Audiovisual Outreach Program (EKKOMED), its funding tools and guidelines, as well as its key objectives: supporting Greek festivals, promoting Greek films abroad, strengthening their distribution, fostering outreach initiatives through the Creative Hub, and ensuring the coordinated representation of Greece and its creative sector in international organizations, festivals, and markets.

Finally, Silvia De Felice from RAI Documentari, established in 2020, delivered a highly engaging masterclass, underlining the growing importance and demand for documentary at a time when audiences increasingly seek factual information. She stressed the responsibility of public television in contrast to the commercial drive of private networks focused on ratings and profit. De Felice explained RAI’s structure, its commitment to co-productions and partnerships, and presented several exciting new documentaries. “Two million viewers for documentaries in Italy is a good figure, but still very small compared to entertainment programming,” she noted. “We want to support documentaries, but also make them accessible to audiences — and educate audiences to watch them.”

Photos from the first 2 days of the Festival you will find HERE.

A short audiovisual recap HERE.

Photos from the Opening Ceremony can be found HERE.

This year’s catalogue can be found HERE.

Photos from the festival can be found HERE and film stills HERE.

Watch the detailed programme of 2025 HERE.

Watch the trailer of the 10th edition HERE.

Selected photos from the Press Conference you can find HERE.

For more information, visit: www.beyondborders.gr or email info@beyondborders.gr

Organized by the Hellenic History Foundation (IDISME), in collaboration with France’s Ecrans des Mondes.

Co-organized by the South Aegean Region with the support of the Hellenic Parliament, Ministry of National Defense, General Secretariat for Greeks Abroad & Public Diplomacy of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, General Secretariat for the Aegean & Island Policy of the Ministry of Shipping, EKKOMED – Creative Greece (National Centre for Audiovisual Media & Communication), Hellenic Broadcasting Corporation (ERT), Greek National Tourism Organization and the embassies of Australia, Germany, Austria, Spain, Switzerland and Italy in Athens.