The Travelling Players

The Travelling Players (Ο θίασος, 1975) is Theo Angelopoulos's epic historical drama, and you can watch it online on iFILM. A struggling theatre troupe wanders the Greek countryside, trying again and again to perform a single pastoral folk play they almost never get to finish.

The story spans 1939 to the early 1950s. As the troupe moves from town to town, the whole convulsion of modern Greece passes through it: the Metaxas dictatorship, the Nazi occupation, liberation, and the brutal civil war. The actors also form a family that quietly replays the ancient tragedy of the House of Atreus — betrayal, vengeance, blood for blood. Some join the partisans, some inform, some are lined up against a wall. Eva Kotamanidou, Vangelis Kazan and Aliki Georgouli embody people the century grinds down without hurry.

Angelopoulos built this nearly four-hour work out of long, gliding takes where the camera becomes a character and time bends forward and back inside a single shot. The film took the FIPRESCI prize as best picture of its decade and sits on every serious list of the greatest of European cinema. It rewards patient viewers who want to feel history in the body rather than hear it explained. Stream The Travelling Players (1975) online on iFILM.