Classical Cinema

We are far today—very far, indeed—from the world of Spartan discipline and Athens under Pericles, that of Homer’s wine-dark Mediterranean, of Aeschylus, Socrates, and Sophocles… but, as the success of a certain recent box-office juggernaut has proven, the echoes of this world resonate deeply with us still. The ancient tragedies, the rich storehouses of Greek mythology with its superhuman heroes and all-too-human Olympians, the melic epic poem: these have been drawn on by an astonishingly diverse collection of filmmakers, providing inspiration for experimental odysseys by Gregory Markopoulos, Italian peplum spectacles, exercises in awestriking austerity by Danièle Huillet and Jean-Marie Straub, and some of Ray Harryhausen’s most enchanting stop-motion wizardry. A cinematic crash course in the classics that will have you giving votive offerings to the Gods.