Z

One of the most important films ever made about Greece

The problem with revolutionary pieces of political cinema is that in retrospect they can appear dated and simplistic when compared to the more sophisticated films that follow them. Costa-Gavras' influential political thriller does suffer from that problem a little at times, but if diminished it is still powerful and effective stuff.Dealing with the assassination of Montand's charismatic political opponent of a regime that is run by the military in all but name (unidentified in the film, it is clearly Greece under the colonels - among the list of things banned by the movie's regime is 'la musique populaire (M. Theodorakis)'. The film's composer was actually under house arrest at the time). The first half of the film covers his arrival and the events leading up to his death at a sabotaged political rally, the second following two parallel investigations into the hows and whys, that of Jean-Louis Trintignant's honest Attorney and co-producer Jacques Perrin's photo-journalist.The film is dialogue heavy (with the honourable exception of Irene Papas, who, as in Zorba the Greek, remains almost mute throughout) and lacks the more effective investigative construction of Missing. It works against the film that we know what has happened - and more importantly, how - so early, since the result of Trintignant's investigation seems a foregone conclusion. It would perhaps have been much more effective if we had seen the various participants very different accounts of events first to draw our own conclusions alongside his.Characterisation is also a sporadic weak point: while those on the sides of the angels all give good performances, only the charismatic Yves Montand seems to be a person we can care about rather than a political or moral position while the military figures are too clearly set up just to be knocked down and veer towards the comic book. Yet it retains an urgency and outrage that ensures that it still commands the attention. If not the masterpiece it was hailed as on its first appearance, it's certainly an excellent film and remains an important landmark in political cinema.Criterion's impressive Region 1 NTSC DVD transfer is a big step up from the standards conversion release Koch Lorber put out a few years ago, though it sadly loses Costa-Gavras' audio commentary from that version, replacing it with on from Peter Cowie, but it goes some to compensating by including new interviews with Costa-Gavras and Raoul Coutard (who has a cameo as the doctor who operates on Montand) as well as archive interviews with Costa-Gavras, Jacques Perrin, Pierre Dux, Yves Montand, Irene Papas, Jean-Louis Trintignant and novelist Vassilis Vassilikos, the original theatrical trailer and a booklet.

The current party in power don't like the look of that great new hope popping up on the left. They try sabotaging Mr. Hype's speech, but his party persevere. So those in power try to put him in hospital. They accidentally kill him. Oops. This is followed up with a fight on the back of a flat bed truck! YES. I can tell early on I was going to like this film. Less furrowed brows, bad ties and paper trails, more drunk driving and hospital treatment.Halfway in an ambitious young judge is in to investigate the incident/accident. He and all those searching for the truth always have the threat of assassination hanging over them. A witness can't even making it to court without being clubbed on the head only to see a woman pop out of the very next car claiming "He was drunk, I saw him! He fell into the road."Oddly for a political assassination movie Z features NO GUNS much like Johnny To's Election, but whereas Election varied from bludgeonings with a stone and stuffing fools in trashcans, Z keeps it simple. Clubs. Numerous riot, protests and demonstrations are broken up by police or freelance muscle sapping a sucker and booting women up the arse. The thugs are a bunch of playful rogues, running around with glee, lying through their teeth when not putting a five on a Lefty.The director makes it clear to the audience what is going on even though the characters may not, who've got to wade knee deep in lies to unravel a conspiracy.Brief flashbacks are used to play out nonsense scenario for the `interpretation' of those in on the incident. Most of all Z remains fun throughout, even slipping in a last minute twist in the epilogue.Minor moan: The batons used constantly throughout the film wiggle around like they're made out of rubber (maybe they are) but it's very visible and it kills the effect a little bit. Be sure to bring your suspension of disbelief!

To begin with let me set the record straight. The "product description" from Amazon mentions a right-wing military dictatorship in Greece in 1963. This is totally untrue and slanderous for the country as at the time the elected Prime Minister Constantine Karamanlis was in power. There were extreme right wing elements both in the Army and in the Police, that tried to cover up the assassination of the deputy Grigoris Lambrakis but they certainly did not organise the killing. As for the prosecutor, Christos Sartzetakis, he ended up becoming President of the Republic some years later, something again not mentioned anywhere in the film.The film itself, in the French language, is well made and it keeps the narrative and the interest of the viewer active throughout. Worth watching, bearing in mind the points I have made in the previous paragraph and the fact that politically this film tends to present the events that took place in Thessaloniki in 1963 in a rather one sided way.