Sokrates Kapsaskis(1928-2007)
- Director
- Writer
- Producer
Sokrates Kapsaskis was a Greek poet, film director, historian and
translator. He was born on the island of Zante. In 1938 he left Zante
to live at his grandfather's house on the Peloponnesus, where he met
the poets Takis Sinopoulos,
Giorgos Pavlopoulos and
'Gavriel
Pentzikis'. Together they
published poems, essays and various translations. He later joined the
Resistance during the Civil War. He moved to Athens after the war,
where he published some of his poems in the art magazine "O Aionas
Mas". In 1953 he published his first books of poetry, "Aesthesis"
(Feelings) and in 1955 "Efimerida" (Newspaper). In 1954 he married
Viktoria Kapsaski and together they left for Paris, where he studied
film directing at the IDHEC. He returned to Athens in 1956, where he
made 13 films until 1966. During the shooting of his last film,
The Hot Month of August (1966),
he met American director Doris Wishman,
who acquired the distribution rights for the film. Without his consent,
Wishman changed the story, added nude scenes and sexier dialog, and for
more than 40 years it would circulate at drive-ins and midnight
screenings with the tagline, "He blew her cool . . . she blew his . . .
and her husband blew all in". After the late 1960s military coup in
Greece, he stopped making films and opened an ArtCinema called
"Studio".
His films include "The Hot Month of August" and One Street Organ, One Life (1958). He won the Aristeion Prize in 1992 for his Greek translation of James Joyce's "Ulysses".
He died on 28 August 2007 due to complications following triple-bypass heart surgery.
His films include "The Hot Month of August" and One Street Organ, One Life (1958). He won the Aristeion Prize in 1992 for his Greek translation of James Joyce's "Ulysses".
He died on 28 August 2007 due to complications following triple-bypass heart surgery.