Z (1969)

“Any similiarity to real persons and events is not coincidental. It is DELIBERATE.”

The leader of the political opposition known only by the title The Deputy gives an impassioned speech to a densely packed crowd in a small union building. The champion of the pacifist movement, he vociferously criticises the foreign policy of the ruling regime, as well as highlighting the violence directed exclusively at his party. Outside, an enraged crowd voices vigorous support for the military, even going as far as ganging up on members of his entourage. Nevertheless, his call for revolution is met with great applause; yet minutes later, he lies face-up in the middle of the road, dying.

Outrage is an ugly emotion—and one that is delivered in excess by Z, a thriller by French-Greek director Costa-Gavras. Using the movie as a conduit, he expresses his own outrage at the volatile political climate of his native Greece. Indeed, Z is in all but name a recounting of the 1963 assassination of prominent anti-war politician Grigoris Lambrakis, as well as its murky aftermath: attempted cover-ups, intimidation and disappearance of key witnesses, all culminating in the 1967 coup which saw the establishment of an oppressive military junta. The title itself, the first letter of the Greek word “Ζει” (He is alive) and a popular pro-Lambrakis graffito, effectively spells out the allegory.

On the other hand, Costa-Gavras’s decision to not tie the movie’s setting to 1960s Greece is a wise one. Despite its ostensibly Mediterranean situation, the story of the film is not tied to anywhere in time or place, but is a constantly reoccurring tale, a template whose names may change every time, but whose underlying gist persists: where there’s power, there’s those who abuse it—and others who resist their oppression.