Search - Rembetiko: Special Edition on DVD

Songs of the underworld

Golovanov Alexey | Limassol, Cyprus | 11/27/2009

(5 out of 5 stars)

"An oustanding, a real breakthrough film by Costas Ferris: the story of rembetika singer (based on true facts of various artists). Voted Most popular Greek film ever in 2000, Silver Bear Award (Berlin Film Festival); Valencia Film Festival; Alexandria Film Festival etc...

Rembetika (or rebetika) was known in Greece and Minor Asia since last century (perhaps even earlier), but after the exodus of Greeks from Turkey in the 20s, thousands of people had to settle in extreme poverty and under almost non-human conditions... The underworld was born - with pimps, criminals, smugglers,spivs, prostitutes and drug dealers... That was the music of the underworld created under strong influence of music tradition of Minor Asia and Middle East and, very often, not without influence of hashish. That was a Greek equivalent of urban blues - if I may say so. That was a broken soul and a bleeding heart crying - without any hope and with only wish to forget the misery of existence for an instance.

The soundrack (music by Stavros Xarhakos)is heartbreaking.

If you wish to understand better, buy also a book by Elias Petropoulos "Songs of the Greek underworld: The Rebetika Tradition" (the best ever written).
As the film success pushed Costas Ferris into further research of rembetika, he managed to produce a musical show, which toured around the world. Although they didn't perform the real rembetika, the "updated" versions were more acceptable for the general (ignorant) audience. So, another CD "Apopse stou Thoma" (recorded for Costas Ferris show, and released in 1991 on Astria/Fabelsound in Greece) is highly recommended."