Are you afraid?
No, I'm not afraid.
Express 290 with destination Germany now arriving on Track One.
Departure time 21:00
Your attention please!
Express 290 for Germany arriving on Track One.
You here again?
What are you doing here night after night?
I dreamt about him last night.
He seemed bigger than the other times.
Come on!
LANDSCAPE IN THE MIST
a film by Theo Angelopoulos
Go to sleep!
When are we going away?
Go to sleep!
- Will you tell me the story? - Again?
In the beginning was the darkness... and then there was light.
And the light was divided from the darkness...
and the earth from the sea... and the rivers, the lakes...
and the mountains were made And then the flowers and the trees...
the animals... the birds...
It's Mummy!
This story will never finish.
She keeps coming and stopping us all the time.
Hello Seagull!
Seagull!
Hello, Seagull!
It's going to rain and my feathers will get wet.
I'm going away.
Where are you going?
To Germany.
Every day you go away to Germany.
Alexander, we're late!
Goodbye!
What's Germany like?
In three minutes Express 290 will be leaving
for Germany on Track One.
Come on!
We made it!
Dear father,
We are writing because we have decided to come and find you.
We have never seen you and we miss you.
We talk about you all the time.
Mummy will be upset that we've gone.
Deep down inside we love her, don't think we don't...
but she doesn't understand anything...
We don't know what you look like...
Alexander says all sorts of things...
He dreams about you. We miss you so much.
Sometimes on my way home from school...
I think I hear footsteps behind me...
your footsteps...
and when I turn to look... there is no one.
Then I feel very lonely.
We don't want to be a burden to you...
we just want to get to know you and then we'll go away again.
If you send us a reply...
Do it with the sound of the train...
tatan... tatan... tatan... tatan...
here I am... I am waiting for you...
tatan... tatan...
Tickets please!
Hey, tickets!
Have you got tickets?
I don't know what you're going to do... just sort things out.
Sit down.
Where are you coming from?
Orchomenos?
Clear the track for the 290.
Announcing the arrival of Express 290.
Yes, yes, yes.
At least tell me where you're going.
Cat got your tongues.
Hell, I'm not going to do the cops' work for them.
We're going to our uncle.
So you've decided to speak.
Good girl!
Well?
How did you get here?
And is that Alexander?
What's up?
They were found without tickets on the express for Germany.
They said they were coming to find you...
Difficult children. I had to pry every word out of them.
Come here, come here and tell me what's going on.
Fine then, everything's settled you don't need me any more.
Just a moment!
Look here...
I can't get involved. I'm not getting involved.
- Aren't you their uncle? - Yes... I am their mother's
brother... but we've been out of touch for years.
I can't take the responsibility. The whole thing's my sister's fault.
Did she have to tell them that their father's in Germany?
What father? What Germany?
She doesn't know who their father is!
There is no father... there is no Germany.
The whole thing's a big lie.
And for what reason?
Because she didn't want to tell them they're illegitimate.
- And this is the result! - But why Germany?
How should I know?
So that they have something to dream about.
Look here... don't get me involved in this.
Notify their mother.
You're lying! You're lying!
Our father is in Germany! You're lying!
Wait here!
It's snowing!
He tied the rope...
Dear father,
How were we able to wait so long?
We've been traveling like a leaf... blowing in the wind.
What a strange world!
Suitcases... freezing railway stations...
words and gestures we don't understand...
and the night which scares us!
But we are happy. We are moving on.
Damn!
He's dying.
He's dead.
Hello there!
What are you doing in this wilderness?
The town's still a long way off.
There's lots of room back there.
I don't eat children.
You haven't told me where you're going.
Far away.
Okay, I'll drop you off in town.
They're stage costumes. And that one there's mine.
What do you do?
I make people laugh...
and cry.
D'you know how difficult that is?
What d'you play?
My part.
Seven knocks on the stage...
then three...
and the curtain goes up
The accordion player plays the overture...
and I enter.
The day dawned and Pleiades shone in the sky.
What's Pleiades?
It is the morning star...
the dawn star... which goes out just before daybreak.
Let her rest... you must have walked a long way.
Want to see something? Come on!
- D'you like it? - Is it yours?
There they are! They're coming!
What happened?
Nothing...
We couldn't get theatre... Do something!
Orestes,
grandfather will die if we don't find a theatre.
Do something! Okay, I'll go to the Pantheon.
I'll meet you back here, okay?
Did you see them?
- They're sad. - Times have changed.
Everything's changed. And ravaged by time they wander
stubbornly all over Greece... always performing the same play.
I've got something to do.
Let her sleep...
I'll be back.
Is your name Orestes?
A sandwich please...
D'you have money?
No, but I'm hungry.
Yes, you're hungry, but you know... to eat you need money!
Even I pay when I'm hungry.
Yes, but I don't have any money and I'm hungry.
I understand.
Listen, if you want to earn money for your food...
you can clear all the tables you see in here...
you'll work a little and then you'll eat. Agreed?
All of them?
Clear them up.
Hey, what's going on here?
Seagull!
Where have you been?
It's flying away. It didn't see me.
Where have you been so long?
See... I earned it for you... I worked.
You're funny kids, you know that?
It's as if you don't care about time going by...
and yet I know that you are in a hurry to leave.
It's as if you're going nowhere... and yet you're going somewhere.
You do know where you're going, don't you?
You're funny too.
Me?
I'm a snail slithering away into nothingness...
I don't know where I'm going.
Once I thought I knew.
Where am I going?
The only thing I know for sure is that in a few days...
I'll be going into the army... to do my military service.
What is it?
Can't see anything.
Look carefully.
Nothing.
Can't you see?
Behind the mist... in the distance... can't you see a tree?
No.
Me neither. I was kidding.
- Will you give it to me? - It's yours.
Where are we?
Good morning!
In the meantime the Turks took Afion Karahisar...
It was in August of l922.
After the Germans left... in the autumn of l944...
the front began to break... ...the British marched into Athens...
The first government of National Unity was formed.
There were rallies... enthusiasm.
Because everyone had believed in the liberation...
and in alliances and in the Allies.
I'm your partner
Come child... let me comb your hair...
That's no way for the hair of a pretty child like you to look.
Who'll do the train?
...and seeing the Nazi collaborators...
free and rearmed by the British...
We felt betrayed.
We were notified to stage a demonstration.
I was arrested at the end of l947.
After the Germans left... in the autumn of l944...
the British marched into Athens.
The first government of National Unity was formed.
There were rallies. There was enthusiasm.
Because everyone believed in alliances and in the Allies.
I keep forgetting the beginning.
Let's figure out how must we lost
...events intervened, sounds,
...ships intervened from the raging open sea...
People are calling out... my breast...
the factories...
October 1917.
October '17. l936...
December 1944.
For this I will keep on wearing the rags I wore...
when the French revolution bore me... when you bore me
Mother Spain...
a dark conspirator.
Here we go
The play that we are going to perform for you tonight...
is Spyridon Peresiades' immortal love story...
Golfo, the Shepherdess...
with a select company of famous actors,
young and not so young. Golfo's tragic love...
will touch the depths of your heart... and all...
I'm sorry you people... it's out of the question.
They want the auditorium for a dance and paying big money.
This era is really terrible
We've worked together for so many years, but...
I'm sorry!
Orestes, take me to town.
Let's go find some place else
I dreamt of him again last night.
I can't walk any further
Where are you going?
Up north.
Come on!
Are you hungry?
For three...
and wine, honey.
Are you going very far north?
Why?
I've come!
Are you new?
Can't you tell?
Where are you going?
- Up north. - Up north where?
I've come again.
I'm coming too.
Dude
The garden is private.
Pay attention to the gladiolus!
Did you hear me?
I'm busy anyway
Got it
Take them with you.
I'm going in the back to get a little sleep.
Come here a minute.
Come with me I'm telling you.
Voula!
Dear father,
How far away you are!
Alexander says that in his dream you seemed very close...
if he stretched out his hand he would have touched you.
We are traveling continually.
Everything goes by so fast...
cities...
people...
but sometimes we get so tired...
too tired to think about you.
We lose our orientation.
Then we get lost.
Alexander has grown up a lot.
He has become very serious.
He gets dressed all by himself.
He says things you wouldn't expect...
I have been very ill the past few days. I was burning up...
now I'm slowly getting better.
But it's such a long way to Germany!
Yesterday I even thought we should give it up...
What is the use of carrying on...
that we shall never get there.
Then Alexander got mad... the way grown-ups get mad...
and he told me I was betraying him.
I was ashamed.
D'you miss Mummy?
We each write to you the same things
and we both fall silent before each other...
looking at the same world...
the light... and the darkness... and you.
That's it! I know it!
We were on the train...
and the train stopped... and the police came on...
and we ran all the way here... and here we found more policemen.
You must help us get away.
We got away!
The sea!
Didn't I say you were funny kids?
And now hold tight. We're taking off!
Are you scared?
No...
- I don't want it ever to end. - What?
This.
If it was summer we could swim.
Yeah
I'm thirsty...
Come on!
A beer and two orange drinks.
Where are we going afterwards?
To Thessaloniki, remember?
Didn't I tell you that night... that in a few days...
I would leave the company and go into the army?
How about you?
I'm not asking. I realize I mustn't ask.
The only thing you gave me to understand...
is that you must catch a train at all costs.
Shall we dance?
I don't know how to dance.
I'll show you.
Let's leave her alone...
Today's she's discovered something very great!
We must leave her alone.
Our journey ends here. At least mine does.
Don't leave go yet!
What? Aren't you leaving?
Not yet.
Aren't you catching the train?
In the evening. Not yet.
So we don't have to leave until evening
I'm insane, too for I feel excited
Let's go
What are you doing?
Have you gone mad?
You're selling off the costumes?
Who decided it?
Where's grandfather?
He's not well... understand? He doesn't want to come out.
These are the ones.
Some day I'll open my mouth...
the gardens will fill with waterfalls... in the same courtyards... the arsenals.
I don't like funerals.
Goodbye.
'Bye.
If I were to shout, who would hear me...
out of the armies of angels?
D'you want it?
How much?
How much are you giving?
It makes me sick to have to sell it.
Okay.
Got a cigarette?
I'll bring it round tomorrow. Tonight I need it.
What we just did... is what we in the theatre call the final act.
Shall we go have something to drink?
Didn't you ask for an orange drink?
What's taking him so long?
You stay here.
Is he asleep?
What's the matter with you?
Nothing.
Get some rest.
I'll be back.
You forgot your bag.
You're going to miss the train.
I wouldn't like us to part like this
To hell with everything else. I don't care.
I wouldn't like us to part like this...
We had agreed I was to take you to the railway station.
I wouldn't like us to part like this.
Little loner, that's the way it is the first time...
that's the way it is the first time...
your heart beats so you think it will break.
That's the way it is the first time, little loner.
Your feet tremble...
you want to die...
How much does the ticket for the border cost?
We'll be expelled again
What's the border?
Money's not enough
When's the last train?
Will you let me have 385 drachmas?
What's your name?
I've said something dumb again.
Your attention please! Passengers for Germany are kindly requested...
to have their passports ready for the border inspection.
Beyond the river lies Germany.
A boat!
Are you afraid?
No, I'm not afraid.
Stop
Wake up, it's light.
We're in Germany!
I'm afraid.
Don't be afraid. I'll tell you the story.
In the beginning was the darkness...
in the beginning was the darkness...
and then there was light.
Translated by Elly Petrides Synchronisation by blueboy (KG)
Copyright C 1988 Greek Film Centre Theo Angelopoulos