''Eden Is West'' (french: Eden à l'ouest) is a 2009 film by
Greek
Greek may refer to:
Greece
Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe:
*Greeks, an ethnic group.
*Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family.
**Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
-
French director
Costa-Gavras
Costa-Gavras (short for Konstantinos Gavras; el, Κωνσταντίνος Γαβράς; born 12 February 1933) is a Greek-French film director, screenwriter, and producer who lives and works in France. He is known for films with political and s ...
about an illegal immigrant called Elias who tries to get to Paris. The original title in Greek is "Paradissos sti Dysi" ("Paradise in West") and since it is a Greek-French production, the original French title is "Eden à l'ouest'. The nationality of the central hero is not disclosed because Gavras wants
[Gavras interview to journal «France-soir» http://www.francesoir.fr/culture/2009/02/11/cinema-costa-gavras-paris-c-etait-mon-reve-aussi.html ] to make a point about the odysseys of the illegal immigrants of any nationality, since he himself was an immigrant 50 years ago in France, before he became a well known director. His hero seems to tolerate the sea, the cold of snowy mountains and the hunger, the rapists and robbers he meets, the cops that are after him all the time, the racists who push him aside, the fellow immigrants who steal his clothes and in the best case the women who see him as a lover they could also take advantage of. His only comfort is his dream of Paris and, in the complexity of human condition, the good within the evil and vice versa.
Plot
Elias (
Riccardo Scamarcio
Riccardo Dario Scamarcio (; born 13 November 1979) is an Italian actor and film producer.
Life and career
Scamarcio was born in Trani, Apulia, the son of Irene Petrafesa, a painter, and Emilio Scamarcio.
He went to train as an actor at the Sc ...
) is an immigrant in his twenties who tries to get to Europe by a boat along with other illegal immigrants. When the boat is near the Greek shores and they hope they will soon disembark, a marine patrol approaches and Elias jumps into the sea in order to avoid arrest. So do the other people in the boat. He wakes up next morning in a shore with nudists, which is not so bad after all, since he has lost some of his clothes while he was swimming for quite a few hours. He pretends to be a nudist himself, steals some clothes and he pretends he is an employee of the hotel "Eden Club-Paradise". Some residents consider him to be an employee and some others a client like themselves. He meets a magician (
Ulrich Tukur
Ulrich Tukur (born Ulrich Gerhard Scheurlen; 29 July 1957) is a German actor and musician.
Early life and education
Tukur spent his youth near Hannover where he finished his final secondary school examinations in 1977. He also earned a high sch ...
) who hires him for a few tricks and since Elias is fairly good, Nick Nickelby, as the magician is called in the movie, tells him "if you find yourself in Paris, come and find me". Elias considers it an invitation and a great opportunity. Going to Paris becomes an obsession.
In the meantime nasty things happen to him: he is raped by the manager of the hotel and in another occasion he is obliged to clean a toilet with his hands because a tenant considers him to be a plumber. He also happens to witness the arrest of a friend of his, an illegal immigrant, who is discovered hiding near the hotel. He also sees the dead bodies of two immigrants who didn’t make it and drowned trying to swim to shore.
A middle-aged German woman named Christina (
Juliane Köhler
Juliane Köhler (born 6 August 1965) is a German theatre, television and film actress. She was born in Göttingen to a puppeteer. During the period from 1985 to 1988, she studied under Uta Hagen in New York City and attended HB Studio. She als ...
) wants him as her lover and offers him refuge in her room. She also gives him money. He leaves the "Eden Club" and tries to travel to Paris by hitch-hiking, without realising how far it is. A man takes advantage of his ignorance and says he will take him to Paris as long as he shares the expenses. Elias wants to prove he can afford it and shows an envelope where he keeps his money. The man steals his money and leaves. A peasant woman passes by with her tractor and takes Elias to her home; there he helps her sell birds and is friendly with her children. Soon after that, he leaves.
The other day he continues his hitchhiking and a couple of Greeks with a Mercedes help him, but some time later they disagree concerning his presence, quarrel and abandon him in snowy mountains. A German truck driver stops and picks him up –he also gives him a jacket. Then he finds a job in a factory, but he realises that his employer is not going to keep his promise and take care of the immigration process. Also, when he tries to eat in the same restaurant with the local employees he is pushed back and this racist episode compels him to run away again.
He ends up in a village hungry and without proper clothes. He steals a jacket but he is found out and is again on the run while somebody cries "damned gypsies". Some gypsies think he is a gypsy and they help him picking him up with their truck. They show him the way for Paris laughing at him for his dream. When he leaves he sees two other trucks approaching the encampment and questioning the gypsies where the thief they’ve just helped is hiding. They are friends of the man from whom he had stolen the jacket. They leave after they throw a petrol bomb in one of their trailers.
Elias, on the run again, finds himself in a village where he meets a compatriot. This is the only time that his mother language is heard. The other immigrant is disillusioned from the "West" and says he is heading back to his country, because there are no jobs in Paris, he does not have any savings, and life back home seems better. He sleeps in a refuge with other homeless people, who steal his jacket. The next day he is heading for Paris and finds club "Lido".
Finally he finds the magician giving a performance from a beautiful, red Citroen DS cabriolet in the street. He approaches him full of expectations and he thinks the magician recognises him. But when the show ends, the magician leaves. Elias runs after the magicians car and cries "Mister" and when the magicians driver stops, the young immigrant tells him "don’t you recognise me? You once told me that if I found myself in Paris, I should come and see you". The magician stares at him and says "Aha, so you’ve done both. You came in Paris and you also saw me". He then gives him a small toy magic wand and leaves. Elias, embarrassed, points the wand awkwardly toward the
Eiffel Tower
The Eiffel Tower ( ; french: links=yes, tour Eiffel ) is a wrought-iron lattice tower on the Champ de Mars in Paris, France. It is named after the engineer Gustave Eiffel, whose company designed and built the tower.
Locally nicknamed "' ...
and by chance the lights on the Tower are lit. Thus, he thinks that indeed this is a magic wand. When many police officers appear, he is scared. He points the magic wand at them, but nothing happens. He puts the wand in his pocket and starts walking toward the gleaming Eiffel Tower.
Cast
*
Riccardo Scamarcio
Riccardo Dario Scamarcio (; born 13 November 1979) is an Italian actor and film producer.
Life and career
Scamarcio was born in Trani, Apulia, the son of Irene Petrafesa, a painter, and Emilio Scamarcio.
He went to train as an actor at the Sc ...
as Elias
*
Juliane Köhler
Juliane Köhler (born 6 August 1965) is a German theatre, television and film actress. She was born in Göttingen to a puppeteer. During the period from 1985 to 1988, she studied under Uta Hagen in New York City and attended HB Studio. She als ...
as Christina
*
Ulrich Tukur
Ulrich Tukur (born Ulrich Gerhard Scheurlen; 29 July 1957) is a German actor and musician.
Early life and education
Tukur spent his youth near Hannover where he finished his final secondary school examinations in 1977. He also earned a high sch ...
as Nick Nickleby
*
Anny Duperey
Anny Duperey (born Annie Legras; 28 June 1947) is a French actress, published photographer and best-selling author with a career spanning almost six decades as of 2021 and more than eighty cinema or television credits, around thirty theatre pr ...
as Nice woman
*
Mona Achache
Mona Achache (born 18 March 1981) is a French-Moroccan film director, actress and screenwriter.
Career
Following a literary and theatrical education Mona Achache becomes an assistant director followed by screenwriting for fictional and documen ...
as Marie-Lou
*
Bruno Lochet
Bruno Lochet (born 18 October 1959) is a French actor. He is best known for playing in the cult TV series '' Les Deschiens'' (1993–2002), in which he played alongside Yolande Moreau
Yolande Moreau (born 27 February 1953) is a Belgian comedi ...
as Yann
*
Antoine Monot, Jr.
Antoine Monot Jr. (born 22 June 1975 in Rheinbach, West Germany) is a Swiss-German actor and film producer with both German and Swiss citizenship. He had his breakthrough with the film ''Absolute Giganten'' in 1999 and became known to a wider audi ...
as Karl
*
Eric Caravaca
The given name Eric, Erich, Erikk, Erik, Erick, or Eirik is derived from the Old Norse name ''Eiríkr'' (or ''Eríkr'' in Old East Norse due to monophthongization).
The first element, ''ei-'' may be derived from the older Proto-Norse ''* ain ...
as the assistant manager of the hotel
* as Le chanteur / musicien
*
Ieroklis Michailidis
Ieroklis Michailidis ( gr, Ιεροκλής Μιχαηλίδης, born 29 September 1960 in Ptolemaida) is a Greek actor. He appeared in more than twenty films since 1992.
Selected filmography
References
External links
*
1960 birt ...
as L'homme du couple dans la Mercedes
*
Michel Robin
Michel Robin (13 November 1930 – 18 November 2020) was a French film, stage, and television actor. A sociétaire of the Comédie-Française since 1996, he also appeared in 120 films from 1966 to 2018. He won several awards for his acting, ...
as The Lido's doorman
*
Konstantinos Markoulakis
Konstantinos Markoulakis, aka Constantine Markoulakis, born in Athens in 1970, is a Greek director and actor. He graduated from Athens College and he studied in Dramatic School of National Theatre. Since 1991, he has been working continuously in ...
as Yvan
*
David Lowe as Fred
*
Tasos Kostis
Tasos Kostis ( el, Τάσος Κωστής; born 14 January 1951) is a Greek film and voice actor. He appeared in more than sixty films since 1980. He's also participated in many dubs.
Selected filmography
Dub of TV shows
References
Exter ...
as Le chauffeur voleur
Awards
The film was shown in
Berlin Festival
Berlin Festival was an annual two-day outdoor rock/electronic music event that took place every September in Berlin.http://www.berlinfestival.de/ Berlin Festival It was first organized in 2005, and over time its audience grew to about 20,000 vi ...
2009 and won the critics award in the festival of «City of Lights, City of Los Angeles" (
COLCOA
The COLCOA French Film Festival (formerly "City of Light, City of Angels") is an annual competitive film festival in Hollywood, created and presented by the Franco-American Cultural Fund (FACF), a unique partnership of the DGA, the MPAA, la SACEM ...
)
References
External links
*
{{Costa-Gavras
2009 films
2000s French-language films
Films directed by Costa Gavras
2009 drama films
French drama films
Greek drama films
Films about immigration
Films shot in Paris
2000s French films