Boy Eating the Bird’s Food

To agori troi to fagito tou pouliou

A provocative character study and an urgent parable for Greece’s economic meltdown.

Even if a screening is sold out, tickets are often available 30 minutes before the start of the film at the box office at each venue.


Image gallery

  • Director-Screenwriter Ektoras Lygizos
  • Producer Ektoras Lygizos, Yorgos Karnavas, Elina Psykou, Argyris Papadimitropoulos
  • With Yannis Papadopoulos, Lila Baklesi, Kleopatra Peraki
  • Greece 2012
  • 80 mins
  • Production company Stefi, Ektoras Lygizos, Guanaco

Yorgos lives alone in a rundown apartment in Athens. He appears to have talent as a choral singer, but that isn’t something that can sustain him financially. Troubled and desperate, he eats his pet canary’s seed, scavenges for scraps throughout the city and behaves increasingly erratically. He begins to fixate on a woman working as a receptionist in a hotel; could she prove to be his salvation? The debut feature from Ektoras Lygizos is a provocative character study shot with vérité styling in claustrophobic close-up on handheld camera, and an urgent parable for Greece’s economic meltdown.
Michael Hayden

Director statement

The pigs – we eat them. The cows – we eat them and we take their milk. The sheep – they give us wool. The dogs, our guardians – they protect our homes. The canaries? What the fuck do canaries do? They are completely useless. We water them, we feed them and the only thing they do is sing.
Ektoras Lygizos

Director biography

Born in Athens in 1976, he has directed for the stage plays by Beckett, Ibsen and Chekhov, while his short film Pure Youth was selected for competition at the Venice Film Festival in 2004. Boy Eating the Bird’s Food is his first feature film.

Filmography

2004 Agna niata (Pure Youth) [s]
2012 To agori troi to fagito tou pouliou (Boy Eating the Bird’s Food)

The Capsule

The Capsule

Director Athina Rachel Tsangari

Greece 2012

35 mins

The latest film from the director of Attenberg is a surreal and elegant delight, featuring seven women carrying out bizarre rituals in a convent-like building situated on a Greek island.
Michael Hayden