VERDICT: Two men share in intimate and intense moment on a deserted shoreline in this short drama about violence, emancipation, and the fine lines between the two.
Explicit answers may be hard to come by in Valentin Stejskal’s 5pm Seaside, but it hardly detracts from the emotional force of this well-mounted and finely acted Greek drama. A stoic two-hander set on a stretch of desolate coastline, it touches upon themes of fraternity and obligation while delving into matters of life, death, rebirth and the murky waters in between. Telling a story that marries brutality and violence with tenderness and care, Stejkal’s film screened at the HollyShorts Film Festival in Los Angeles shortly after receiving a special mention from the Sarajevo Film Festival’s main competition jury.
The sun slowly rises on a remote house on a windswept beach where, sat nearby in the cab of his lorry, Nikos (Antonis Tsiotsiopoulos) is turning forty. Once daylight has broken, he goes to the water’s edge and lays out a defibrillator and oxygen mask on a blanket and waits. He’s waiting for another member of his former military unit, Christos (Kimonas Kouris), to return home and from whom he requires an unusual, somewhat unsettling, favour. The two men have clearly not seen one another for several years and Christos is taken aback at Nikos’ arrival and request, and the two come to blows before Christos relents.
The nature of the relationship between the two men is not put into words but would seem to blur the lines between professional and personal, platonic and passionate. Christos’ resentment for being asked to perform this task eventually dissolves into deep empathy. The action itself – which involves being forcibly submerged for a dangerous period of time – takes on an almost euphoric, baptismal quality. The handheld camera bobs on the water and dips below to observe Nikos’ prone form, while brilliant sunlight glints off the rippling surface. While the exact arrangement the two men have remains ambiguous, it is suggested to be some sort of recompense. In the film’s opening scene, however, Nikos is phoned by his mother who recounts to him his own traumatic birth – “no pulse” and “not enough liquid” – and the entire experience subsequently takes on the aspect of a symbolic restaging of past trauma. At the hands of a loved one, it feels like an attempt to recapture some semblance of vitality and wash away the pains of the past, even at the greatest of risks.
Director: Valentin Stejskal
Screenplay: Valentin Stejskal, Glykeria Patramani
Cast: Antonis Tsiotsiopoulos, Kimonas Kouris
Producers: Alisa Frischholz, Ioanna Petinaraki, Valentin Stejskal, Samir Ljuma
Cinematography: Samir Ljuma
Editing: Martin Ivanov
Sound: Stelios Koupetoris
Venue: HollyShorts
In Greek
26 minutes
