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Eleni

  • 1985
  • PG
  • 1h 54m
IMDb RATING
6.9/10
1.7K
YOUR RATING
John Malkovich and Kate Nelligan in Eleni (1985)
DramaWar

A mother's love for her children leads to a son's revenge for her death in this dramatic thriller that begins during the Greek civil war.A mother's love for her children leads to a son's revenge for her death in this dramatic thriller that begins during the Greek civil war.A mother's love for her children leads to a son's revenge for her death in this dramatic thriller that begins during the Greek civil war.

  • Director
    • Peter Yates
  • Writers
    • Nicholas Gage
    • Steve Tesich
  • Stars
    • Kate Nelligan
    • John Malkovich
    • Linda Hunt
  • See production info at IMDbPro
  • IMDb RATING
    6.9/10
    1.7K
    YOUR RATING
    • Director
      • Peter Yates
    • Writers
      • Nicholas Gage
      • Steve Tesich
    • Stars
      • Kate Nelligan
      • John Malkovich
      • Linda Hunt
    • 35User reviews
    • 12Critic reviews
  • See production info at IMDbPro
  • See production info at IMDbPro
  • Photos49

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    Top cast38

    Edit
    Kate Nelligan
    Kate Nelligan
    • Eleni
    John Malkovich
    John Malkovich
    • Nick
    Linda Hunt
    Linda Hunt
    • Katina
    Oliver Cotton
    Oliver Cotton
    • Katis
    Ronald Pickup
    Ronald Pickup
    • Spiro
    Rosalie Crutchley
    Rosalie Crutchley
    • Grandmother
    Glenne Headly
    Glenne Headly
    • Joan
    Dimitra Arliss
    Dimitra Arliss
    • Ana (Czechoslovakia)
    Steve Plytas
    Steve Plytas
    • Christos
    Peter Woodthorpe
    Peter Woodthorpe
    • Grandfather
    Jon Rumney
    Jon Rumney
    • Lukas
    Alison King
    • Lukas' Wife
    Leon Lissek
    Leon Lissek
    • Antoni
    Stefan Gryff
    • Tasso
    Andrea Laskari
    • Nikola
    Lisa Rose
    Lisa Rose
    • Olga
    Claudia Gough
    • Fotini
    Maria Calvente
    • Alexandra
    • Director
      • Peter Yates
    • Writers
      • Nicholas Gage
      • Steve Tesich
    • All cast & crew
    • Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

    User reviews35

    6.91.7K
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    Featured reviews

    10morrisonhimself

    Powerful, haunting tale of mother love vs. communist atrocity

    Stunning performances by Kate Nelligan and most of the cast in this powerful story, based on truth, help make this a must-see film.

    I wonder if some of the reviewers, such as onceuponatime500, really saw the movie, or if they just wrote from some vicious and preconceived bias.

    The communists come to the village to conscript -- kidnap -- children to become guerrilla fighters. The mother, Eleni, takes a drastic step, mutilating her oldest child to spare her from being shanghaied into the communist forces.

    Being communists, they will not be thwarted, not by any such reactionary notions as self-ownership, or freedom, or parental rights, or any of that silly stuff: They take the next oldest girl instead.

    Eleni loves her children and believes, foolishly according to onceuponatime500, but in line with what Charlie Anderson (James Stewart) in "Shenandoah" said: They're my children, not the state's, not some murderous movement's.

    For years after seeing this powerful and haunting story, I could recall Nelligan's last scene and be moved to tears.

    The agony Eleni went through was duplicated millions of times in the bloody 20th Century, as some government or another, or some tyrannical movement or another, kidnapped young people to force them to risk their lives for some cause most of them didn't understand, much less support.

    Think Viet Cong, think Hitler's armies, think Stalin's and Mao's imperialist and aggressive armies, and, yes, think of the poor draftees from the United States.

    Think, contrastingly, of parents, parents who spent years loving and caring for their children, hoping those children would be able to live to a better adulthood than their parents. Think of those parents seeing their children sometimes literally torn from their grasp, thrown into lines to be cannon fodder for cruel warlords -- communists, Nazis, imperialists of one kind or another, even when disguised as crusaders.

    "Eleni" works at almost every level except for the incredibly horrible performance by John Malkovich.

    If it hadn't been seen as anti-communist, even Hollywood would have honored "Eleni." But its being anti-communist made "Eleni" an outcast in that artistically and morally corrupted town. However, "Eleni" is powerful drama.

    Added 25 November 2017: Watching "Eleni" on YouTube, I am wondering if my dislike of John Malkovich's performance is at least as much for how unpleasant he makes Nick Gage. As portrayed by Malkovich, Gage is rude, cold, aloof; he has no personality, doesn't respond to people, not even to his wife who asks questions. As performed by Malkovich, Gage's personality is enough to chase away a viewer.

    We are now exactly 100 years after the Bolshevik revolution in Russia, an event that led to hundreds of millions of deaths, and destruction of entire nations, of entire peoples.

    There is an irony in Nick Gage's working for The New York Times, which has been frequently pro-communist, and nearly always anti-anti- communist, with its Moscow correspondent Walter Duranty infamously painting a rosy picture of the Soviet Union during the time of the murderous monster Josef Stalin.

    This century anniversary makes "Eleni" even more poignant and even more important.
    7gv416-1

    Good Movie

    Great movie, with a good performance from Kate Nelligan. Cant believe all the people defending communist kidnappers and murderers, after all the years of Nazi murders, people actually defend thugs kidnapping children, murdering villagers who refused to agree with them, etc, etc, etc.... The Greek Civil War was nothing more than Stalin trying to add Greece to his list of appetizers along with Poland, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, etc... Stealing children to take behind the iron curtain, executing parents who try to keep their own children, stealing houses, livestock and food crops to feed the murderers of their own people is not a good thing and this movie sends that message in spades. People are supposed to be happy about being out from under the fascist murderers and put under the domination of communist ones???????
    battlehill

    Eleni and truth

    I have seen this movie and it is very gripping and entertaining, unfortunately it does not tell the whole story of Greece and what the resistance actually was and who they were fighting. In particular this story is one that as usual suffers from lies of omission and the simplification of very complex political issues into good vs. evil. Perhaps Eleni was faced with an evil leader of the left, however do we know who and why the left was actually fighting. Quickly, Greece had a King and Aristocracy that was controlled by a military dictator before WWII, Greece was pivotal to British interests in Egypt (Suez Canal and Middle East Oil -Iran) and basically Great Britain backed this military dictator. When WWII broke out the king and dictator fled and it was the Greek people who fought the Germans and Italians, England actually fought with them at the end also. Problem, average Greek person did not want King or fascist dictator back (this is the communist group - which they were really leftist not Stalin communist). Greeks wanted to govern themselves and this is not what Great Britain - they wanted King and dictator back and guess who won . The King came back until the late 50's and 60's were Greek people won their independence. On mean idiot that was communist does not mean that all of the things the left was fighting for were wrong - this is pure and simple propaganda.
    7ccthemovieman-1

    Decent Story But In A Word: Grim

    This is another of those supposedly based-on-a-true story accounts, this one dealing with a man's (writer Nicholas Gage) quest to return to his native Greece and avenge his mother's death which occurred 30 years earlier.

    This is not an uplifting story but it's not depressing, either.....but it is grim. It begins with the Grecian mother protecting her kids from the vicious Communisits of the late 1940s. The film switches back and forth from that period to modern-day but it's never disjointed. The acting by John Malkovich, Kate Nelligan and Linda Hunt is excellent and the scenery is pleasing and very little, if any, profanity if memory serves me. It's a decent film but not anything I'd watch more than once.
    Mag-13

    It's about motherhood, not ideology.

    Other people commenting on this film complain about its being mere propaganda against communism and supporting fascism. What a lot of baloney. It's about mothers and children, and about how, no matter what kind of brawl is going on, the men run to the hills, leaving the women and children behind to be brutalized. And it's about how one woman lost her life because she refused to give her children up to the state, no matter who that state was.

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    Storyline

    Edit

    Did you know

    Edit
    • Trivia
      Additional flashback scenes were filmed featuring Alfred Molina as Nick's father Christos (played by Steve Plytas in the 1980s scenes). Although Molina was credited as "Young Christos" in press materials, and his scenes were shown in publicity photos, his role was almost completely cut from the final version, and his name does not appear in the credits. Molina's only remaining footage in the released film is a single shot of Christos taking a photograph of Eleni, Nikola and family, with his face partially obscured by his camera.
    • Connections
      Featured in At the Movies: Silver Bullet/Twice in a Lifetime/Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins/Dim Sum (1985)

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    FAQ17

    • How long is Eleni?Powered by Alexa

    Details

    Edit
    • Release date
      • December 21, 1985 (Japan)
    • Country of origin
      • United States
    • Language
      • English
    • Also known as
      • Елені
    • Filming locations
      • Athens, Greece
    • Production companies
      • CBS Entertainment Production
      • CBS Theatrical Films
      • Eleni Productions
    • See more company credits at IMDbPro

    Box office

    Edit
    • Budget
      • $12,000,000 (estimated)
    • Gross US & Canada
      • $305,102
    • Opening weekend US & Canada
      • $27,875
      • Nov 3, 1985
    • Gross worldwide
      • $305,102
    See detailed box office info on IMDbPro

    Tech specs

    Edit
    • Runtime
      1 hour 54 minutes
    • Color
      • Color
    • Sound mix
      • Dolby Stereo
    • Aspect ratio
      • 1.85 : 1

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