I avoided this film when I was in Greece because of a bad review in Athinorama. The reviewer took exception with Writer/Director Yelena Popovic's choice to only briefly cover the intrigues that led to Saint Nektarios's expulsion from Alexandria. Now that I have seen the film, I disagree. It was a good movie that reminded me of the 2006 film "The Island" directed by Pavel Lungin. In a society with no social safety net, Saint Nektarios saved lives. Hostility towards the poor in that era (think 1890-1920) was even worse than it is now. Political intrigue would take the film in an entirely different direction.
We see Saint Nektarios save a young woman from a crazy and abusive mother. He helps young women establish a Monastery. The girls who found the Monastery are poor. One is blind. A young male student from the Seminary that he runs, the Rizario School, is at death's door and needs a hospital. The school executives want to send him to a sanitorium to avoid a bill. Saint Nektarios makes sure to send him to the hospital and covers the cost himself. This young man's death would leave a poor family bereft of a wage-earner. When the school janitor falls ill, Saint Nektarios works his shift to preserve his job and save the man's family from destitution.
Over the course of the film, it is clear why the ambitious and untalented would want to oust Nektarios Pentapoleos from the running for the Seat of the Patriarch! But while there were people who hated him, there were more who could not live without him! Kostas, the young blond man who works at the Rizario School and who seems not to like Nektarios at first comes to the Monastery in Aegina and helps.
The costumes were on point. The set design and scenery felt true. I am a native Greek speaker but did not find the film being in English distracting in the least.
We see Saint Nektarios save a young woman from a crazy and abusive mother. He helps young women establish a Monastery. The girls who found the Monastery are poor. One is blind. A young male student from the Seminary that he runs, the Rizario School, is at death's door and needs a hospital. The school executives want to send him to a sanitorium to avoid a bill. Saint Nektarios makes sure to send him to the hospital and covers the cost himself. This young man's death would leave a poor family bereft of a wage-earner. When the school janitor falls ill, Saint Nektarios works his shift to preserve his job and save the man's family from destitution.
Over the course of the film, it is clear why the ambitious and untalented would want to oust Nektarios Pentapoleos from the running for the Seat of the Patriarch! But while there were people who hated him, there were more who could not live without him! Kostas, the young blond man who works at the Rizario School and who seems not to like Nektarios at first comes to the Monastery in Aegina and helps.
The costumes were on point. The set design and scenery felt true. I am a native Greek speaker but did not find the film being in English distracting in the least.