The Ogre of Athens

Watching "The Dragon" one can very well understand the reason why greek audiences took a dislike to it back in the fifties. The film was anything but the sobby dramas or the shallow comedies of the time. It was shocking, dark, daring, deeply political and heartbreaking. It held a mirror to the troubled greek society and naturally people were alarmed and confused by what they saw. But nowadays there is little doubt that Koundouros's melancholic satire defined greek cinema, by iniating fresh and more daring ways of film-making in Greece. Six and a half decades after its creation, the artistic and cultural value of the film remains intact.