Athina Rachel Tsangari On Her Emotional Return To Greece With ‘Harvest’ & Plans For Her Next Feature, A “Screwball Heist Set In The Near Future”

Unlike most late fall festivals Thessaloniki in Northern Greece regularly draws packed crowds of passionate and youthful patrons, largely thanks to the city’s significant student population. On Saturday at the festival’s Olympia Theatre, however, a distinct waft of emotion was in the air when Athina Rachel Tsangari arrived to present her latest feature Harvest.

A loose adaptation of British writer Jim Crace’s novel of the same name, Harvest, a psychedelic trip of great ambition and scale, is the first feature from Tsangari in almost a decade. Tsangari, who learned her trade first as a student and later film programmer in Thessaloniki, has spent much of that time outside of Greece and now resides in Los Angeles, where she teaches film directing at CalArts. Saturday’s screening was a homecoming.

“I was crying at the start. It was quite emotional,” she told us the morning after the screening.

Set over seven hallucinatory days, Harvest tells the story of a rural village community with no name, in an undefined time and place, that begins to break at the seams after the arrival of four strangers. Tsangari wrote the screenplay with Joslyn Barnes. The film was produced by Rebecca O’Brien (Sixteen Films), and Barnes (Louverture Films) alongside The Match Factory and Tsangari’s Haos Film. The Match Factory is handling sales.

Alongside Jones, the film stars Harry Melling, Rosy McEwen, Arinzé Kene, Thalissa Teixeira, and Frank Dillane. Sean Price Williams was the DoP and the film was edited by Matt Johnson and Nico Leunen.

Below, Tsangari discusses the project, which debuted in Venice and why it was so difficult to raise funds to produce it. She also discusses returning to Greece, why she added Black character’s to the film’s cast, and her plans to direct a “screwball heist.”

The Thessaloniki Film Festival runs until November 10.

DEADLINE: How does it feel to be back in Greece with a new film?

ATHINA RACHEL TSANGARI: It was quite emotional. There are so many factors. I was a student in the humanities school here in Thessaloniki. As an undergrad, I was indoctrinated into auteur cinema by many hardcore cinephile friends. My first film The Slow Business of Going was dedicated to my main cinema mentor from my time here. Then, I started programming the midnight series here called Orgasmic Cinema. And when I was producing Yorgos Lanthimos’ films we came here, so it’s really a homecoming. I just think it’s a very well-programmed festival. They put so much care into everything. And there’s an incredible audience here because it’s a student town. Also, Greece is a truly cinephile country. We take pride in knowing about movies and tracking new films by directors. Whether it’s the top of winter or the summer, the cinemas are healthily attended.

DEADLINE: How did this project come to you? I know the guys at Sixteen Films were excited about it for some time.

DETAILS: The project originated from three producers. It was Joslyn Barnes, who optioned the book and wrote the first draft with Michael Weber from The Match Factory and Rebecca O’Brien. I got a call from Michael who is a dear friend. He had suggested me to Rebecca and Joslyn and they agreed. They sent me the first draft and the book to start. I was finishing the limited series Trigonometry at the time.

DEADLINE: How did this project come to you? I know the guy at Sixteen Films were excited about it for some time.

DETAILS: The project originated from three producers. It was Joslyn Barnes, who optioned the book and wrote the first draft with Michael Weber from The Match Factory and Rebecca O’Brien. I got a call from Michael who is a dear friend. He had suggested me to Rebecca and Joslyn and they agreed. They sent me the first draft and the book to start. I was finishing the limited series Trigonometry at the time. It was the beginning of the pandemic, but for me and the speed I usually work, this came together like the speed of light. Just four years from reading the first draft to premiering was fast, especially as it was a difficult film to adapt. Joslyn and I worked remotely on the script for a while and then she gave me her blessing once I started casting at which point the story began to change because I adapt according to specific characters and who will embody them.

DEADLINE: Why do you think you work at a slower pace?

DETAILS: I just want to take the time that I feel like I need. I need to make sure a project is something I absolutely need to do. Not that the world needs it or anything like that but why do I need to do it. These are the questions I work through before committing to something.

DEADLINE: So did you feel uncomfortable with the pace of this production?

DETAILS: No, there was actually some time between their offer and me saying yes. And I really struggled with it because I went through the book which was quite challenging for me in terms of the language and then I had to think about what I could do with the material. I said yes and then talked to them about my ideas. I immediately said I wanted to do it in Scotland, not England and they said sure. I began contributing to the script and twisted it upside down. So with the writing and financing, which included a lot of public funding from France, Germany, the UK, and Greece, it was about two years, which is the least amount of time it could take in Europe. So we were lucky.

DEADLINE: I don’t know if you’re aware but Harvest played an integral role in the introduction of the UK’s new indie film tax rebate. Earlier this year, Rebecca spoke so passionately in front of parliament about the struggles of financing this film. And that seemed to really kick start plans for new support for indie film.

DETAILS: It’s so amazing to have a policy change. This was a really difficult film to put together.

DEADLINE: Why was it so difficult? You and Rebecca are both very well-respected professionals. It would seem that people would want to give you money.

DETAILS: And they did. We got the Grand Accord from both France and Germany. Only one or two films get that a year. We got money from the BBC and Screen Scotland with all our credentials combined. It’s a film that truly came into its own when we shot it. As a script, the character doesn’t actually do anything. And no one saves the day. So some people had difficulty with the script. It’s not a script that reads commercial at all. But because there is public funding this film got made. If we were trying to make this film in America it probably wouldn’t have been made. I know that for a fact because quite a few people turned us down. And we still don’t have American distribution because of the complex financial terms of U.S. equity with soft funds from Europe. Unfortunately, we still have some way to go with this.

DEADLINE: Last night at the Q&A after the screening did you say you lived in the Scottish fields for some time?

DETAILS: No, we lived in the area, not in the fields. Caleb did, though. And I did to a certain extent before the film when I went to the fields to walk through and block out the scenes.

DEADLINE: The first sequence in the film is so impressive. I can imagine how difficult that must have been with the conditions in Scotland. How long did that take to shoot?

DETAILS: Oh, it was just a few hours and it was like taking a walk because it was a skeleton crew. We were all on foot. Sean [Price Williams] is a wild man. It was me Sean, the sound recordist, and Caleb. That was it. This was the first thing we shot as a test to see if the handheld camera could work with all the rat holes and ant hills in the ground. We really just followed Caleb around and filmed his interactions. When he goes into the water naked he gave us that glorious butt shot and he knew exactly where the camera was. He knew what he was doing. It was so funny.

DEADLINE: Neither Arinze Kene’s character nor Thalissa Teixeira’s are Black in Jim Crace’s book. The change is very clever because it makes the film very contemporary. Why did you make that switch.

DETAILS: Because of Arinze. I don’t really cast for race. But I just wanted to work with Arinze. I called him up. He’s a playwright, director, actor, dancer, and choreographer. But he’d moved to Thailand where he had taken up martial arts and was competing in professional tournaments. So we lost him. Our start date was getting closer and I was wrapping up casting and called him again. He was back in London and available at that point, which was amazing. It was the same with Thalissa, who plays Mistress Beldam and is described as ‘exotic looking’, whatever that means, in the book. I immediately knew I wanted to work with her because of Trigonometry. There have been a couple of critics who have taken issue with us not spelling out the fact the characters are Black. But it’s so obvious. They show up and they’re immediately scapegoats and there’s xenophobia galore.

DEADLINE: I don’t tend to ask this question but since you’ve been teasing it in the press, what are you working on next?

DETAILS: I’m really excited about three projects. I’ve been writing a lot. I have three scripts that are done. One is co-written with my partner Ian Hassett and my oldest creative collaborator, Matt Johnson, who has also edited all of my films. It’s a screwball heist set in the near future. I’ve also been developing a film with an actor for two years. I’ve been writing the script while work-shopping with her. It’s been a great experience and I wouldn’t be surprised if that happened first. This is an exciting one because I’ve admired this actor for many years.

DEADLINE: Can you say which actor?

DETAILS: I can’t.