The Signature is a dark psychological thriller set against the backdrop of the high-end art scene in Athens and Paris, cutting back and forth between the present day, and decades earlier, when an affair began. Anna (Alexia Kaltsiki), a young art critic and curator, is involved in organizing a retrospective of works by a famous and successful painter Maria Dimou (Maria Protopappa), who died in suspicious circumstances some fifteen years beforehand.
She contacts Maria’s long-term lover, Angel (Georges Corraface), in the hope that he can provide some context for the exhibition. Angel is frail and sick but agrees to offer what assistance he can. When she visits him for the interview however, she discovers he has a great many of Maria’s unknown works, paintings no one knew existed, and his explanations as to how he came by them raise more questions than they answer.
This sets Anna on a course of investigation which becomes increasingly complicated by fabrications, lies and false leads, as she strips back layers of the past to finally discover a tortuous truth. Written and directed by Stelios Charalambopoulos, the story is revealed through a series of flashbacks. At first it seems to be about an old man still carrying a torch for a long lost love.
Then it takes an unexpected turn; alarm bells signal a detective story about an art fraud, and finally it seems there’s the ominous possibility of it being a murder mystery. The Signature is shot to reflect its subject matter. It is deliberately, self-consciously arty, and though some of it works, it gets in the way of the story in places. Some of the outdoor scenes are beautifully framed and shot. Indoors, the lighting can be a little more problematic. As the action moves between the past and the present, there are some neat transitions that catch you off guard initially. It is quite disorientating, so for a moment you are not sure what you’re seeing, as though your memory is playing tricks on you.
It can be heavy going, but this is in keeping with the tone of the subject matter. Even when the characters are at their happiest, the tension between them is palpable. She smokes incessantly, he can hardly breathe. She seeks fame, he’s very private. She believes in absolutes, he’s a relativist. What is ultimately exposed is the consuming love of opposites. And as the story progresses, a question hardly posed, let alone answered, hangs over everything: what mysterious fate really befell the beautiful, talented, tormented Maria?
The Signature is showing in Adelaide, Brisbane, Melbourne and Sydney at The Greek Film Festival in October.
For more information, go to www.greekfilmfestival.com.au