A middle-aged fisherman living on Greece's northern border, who is drowning in debt, starts to smuggle migrants across the border lake, in exchange for a hefty fee. His wife, a housewife and devout churchgoer, is seeking the truth in God's Word, while their daughter tries to define her own life within an oppressive environment. Until a tragic incident strikes the family, pushing the three heroes to face their own personal impasses and weaknesses, whilst having to consider, for the first time in their life, the price to pay for their actions.

Directed by: Asimina Proedrou

Written by: Asimina Proedrou

Produced by: Ioanna Bolomyti, Markus Halberschmidt, Vladimir Anastasov, Angela Nestorovska

Cinematography: Simos Sakertzis

Editing: Electra Venaki

Production Design: Eduard Georgiou

Costume Design: Kiki Miliou

Make-Up: Dora Nazou

Sound: Nikos Papadimitrioiu, Electra Venaki, Persefoni Miliou, Kostas Varibopiotis

Original Score: Marios Strofalis

Visual Effects: Antonis Kotzias

Casting Director: Sotiria Marini, Sofia Dimopoulou, Fragiskos Xydianos, Akis Gourzoulidis

Cast: Stathis Stamoulakatos, Lena Ouzounidou, Eugenia Lavda

Original Title: PISO APO TIS THIMONIES

Film Production Country: Greece

Social Media:

https://www.facebook.com/BehindTheHaystacksFilm
https://www.instagram.com/behind_the_haystacks_film/?hl=am-et
Statement of the Director/s
I am a Greek writer and director with a personal filmmaking style. My stories focus on contemporary social issues of the individual human experience, through the lens of women’s perspectives. I am interested in how we – ordinary people – are trapped in our ‘modern’ societies, and how social structures reproduce themselves, driving us away from our ‘true’ needs and desires. My stories have their roots in psychoanalytic approaches and social anthropology and are related to my philosophical and political explorations as well as my fears. As a writer-director, I strive to explore these themes in a relatable way through authentic and genuine local characters at the heart of my stories. I constantly experiment with new POV narrative structures that take us deeper into individual characters and their inner world. I also leverage the technical constraints of filmmaking to experiment with new visual styles that support my psychological, character-driven narratives.

Behind the Haystacks is my debut feature film. It is a social drama with thriller elements taking place in 2015 in a lakeside village on the Greek Northern border, where hundreds of migrants gather every day with the goal to illegally cross into Northern Europe.

This story is told from three different perspectives, through a ‘Rashomon-style’ narrative: we gradually discover, through the individual perspectives of three family members, the consequences of self-motivated desires and prejudices related to a central incident. The story takes place in a local corrupt and patriarchal society, while raising questions about how an entire community can be led to crime, deception, submission and collective denial. At the same time, the background highlights the hypocrisy of our ‘civilised’ Western societies, which on the one hand shed tears for humanity, but on the other hand become accomplices in the exploitation, impoverishment, displacement and even death of thousands of people. Behind the Haystacks is thus, an exploration about where our modern societies are being led to and why, and about the way individual human relationships collapse within these societies. An exploration, which, however, has no intention of condemning the everyday man who – defeated – submits to corrupt social structures. On the contrary, it attempts to shed light onto the darkness and unveil everything that is human and beautiful in his/her everyday struggle to survive, from his/her need to love, to enjoy her life, and improve the world around her.

The film was shot during the second Covid lockdown in 2021, in different locations in Greece and North Macedonia - under extremely difficult circumstances. However, the challenging constraints and countless obstacles helped us take bold and risky decisions in a creative and emotionally gripping process, that turned constraints into new visual stylistic choices. These stylistic decisions related to camerawork, framing and offscreen sound, although initiated by technical constraints themselves, finally served the narrative in a unique and original way, and were coherently embodied into the overall lyrical, intense and intimate style of the film.

Biography of the Director/s
Asimina Proedrou was born in 1982, in Athens, Greece. She studied music (piano degree in 2001), International Economics (BA in 2005 and MSc in 2007) and Film Directing (BA in 2013 and MA in 2016), while working for the finance department of a large international corporation for fourteen years.

She has produced, written and directed two multi-awarded short films (Facets of Lonliness, 2012; Red Hulk, 2013). Her short film, Red Hulk (2013), won the Best Short Film Awards at the two major film festivals in Greece. It was officially selected for more than seventy international film festivals, including Clermont-Ferrand (International Competition 2014), and won seven international awards.

Her debut feature film, Behind the Haystacks (2022), is a Greek-German-North Macedonian co-production, developed through Berlinale Script Station and First Film First, and supported, among others, by the Greek Film Centre and ERT, MEDIA, ZDF-Arte and Eurimages.

Behind the Haystacks premiered at the 63rd Thessaloniki International Film Festival (National Premiere) in November 2022, where it won six awards including Fipresci Award, and at the 53rd International Film Festival of India (Goa) (International Premiere) where it won the Best Debut Feature Award. It also participated in the EFP Program, Europe! Voices of Women in Film at the Sydney International Film Festival and was selected for the Galway film Fleadh (International Competition – July 2023).

The film is currently in its 28th week of major cinema screening in Greece. It has been critically acclaimed both locally and Internationally (Screen Daily, The Film Verdict, Fipresci, Variety, Screen Daily New Talents Focus), and was described as “an intriguing and deft debut […] of an intense psychological study of murky morality” (Screen Daily) and “a contemporary Greek tragedy” in which Proedrou juggles “multi-character complexity and non-linear narratives with impressive dexterity” (The Film Verdict).

Behind the Haystacks won 10 awards at the Greek Film Academy awards, including the prestigious Best Film Award, along with an impressive total of nine additional accolades: Best Director, and Best First-Time Director, Best Screenplay, Best Cinematography, Best Editing, Best Sound, Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor and Best Supporting Actress. This achievement also marks a record-breaking number of nominations in the history of the institution, as the film got a nod in a whopping 17 categories.

Filmography of the Director/s
2013 - RED HULK, Short

Production Company:
Argonauts Productions S.A.
Ioanna Bolomyti
E-Mail: [email protected]
Phone: +306973742791
Website: https://www.argonautsproductions.gr/

World Sales:
TVCO
Lediona Kasapi
E-Mail: [email protected]
Phone: +4915222361751
Website: https://www.tvco.eu/