"I learned to love the slow business of filmmaking." - Athina Rachael Tsangari

"Athina Tsangari is Petra Going" - Bryan Poyser, script supervisor

It is no surprise that producer/director Athina Rachael Tsangari, a native of Athens, New York and Austin - surely among other places, has crafted a film that uses film language so boldly and in such unique ways. Language and culture is paramount to Tsangari's "The Slow Business of Going." The film is a somewhat biographical piece that explores our modern culture's sense of homelessness evolving from the dissolving cultural and physical borders of modern times. Concurrently, these themes lead to a notion of ease in all cultures and in all countries since someone who is homeless, i.e. without a native country or culture, a traveler, can feel at home anywhere. Tsangari, it would appear, is such a person.

"The Slow Business of Going" revolves around Petra Going (Lizzie Martinez), an attractive and seemingly Middle Eastern young woman who was born on a plane traveling from Greece to Mexico. Petra, whose name can be translated to mean "rolling stone," works for some sort of strange organization that has her travel around the world and then make reports of what she has seen and heard and done (via some sort of dream machine). This is really a wonderful cinematic device Tsangari uses to allow a discussion of her own life and her own travels to come forth on the screen. Petra begins in the present, in a hotel room in Houston in the year 2000 before returning through her memory (i.e. flashbacks) to her world travels. Most of these stops find Petra in hotel rooms with different men. Perhaps here, Tsangari is exploring her own relationships throughout the world with various men - and, it is suggested, women.

Regardless, the narrative is loose and simply a conduit from which art can flow. Tsangari is a master avant-garde filmmaker. She doesn't tell stories as much as present cinematic oddities which suggest stories. In one scene, a man mocks killing other men, in a very odd and interesting sort of dance, before taking Petra to a hotel room. From this we assume, like others in Petra's romantic life, that he is some sort of killer. This unusual approach to storytelling continues when Petra and the man are in a hotel room together and, rather than have dialogues, arguments or sexual scenes, they do symbolic actions which suggest such typical dramatic events. For example, the couple reads poetry and build upon the repetition of a stanza to begin turning it into an accapella song. This is used to represent "love" to a certain degree, or at least fornication.

I really shouldn't try to explain Tsangari's film. You really must see it to enjoy and comprehend it. And it is beautiful to behold. Tsangari films each and every frame lovingly and uniquely. There isn't a boring moment in the film. Notice her opening segment which uses the modern hotel window overlooking a deserted city to play with and suggest frames within the picture. She also uses interesting montage and artistic techniques to propel the film. There are a few segments where computer effects create several frames while computer generated text appears on the screen to help explain Petra with sayings like "I am not a tourist" and "Nor an expatriate." There is also a wonderful and clever animated sequence where Petra explains herself as an automobile. And, there is a delightful slapstick scene as well. Again, you just have to see this stuff to get it. It is wonderful. And it always fits.

Tsangari simply uses everything at her disposal to create the film. And she also recognizes and works within her limitations as well. For example, since she is using low budget 8, 16 and 35mm stock to film with, she doesn't utilize live sound very often. Let's face it, live sound is a bitch. To overcome this obstacle, she makes Petra seem somewhat telepathic as she has conversation with a female friend. To present this, Tsangari simply shows close-ups of the young ladies' faces while dubbed dialogue voiced by the duo plays out. A simple and perhaps typical device which the director makes her own.

Coming from the Richard Linklater school of film, Tsangari is herself a former UT professor and co-founder of the Cinematexas short film festival here in Austin. She surely has worked with the Cinemaker Co-op as well as Barna Kanter, founder of the Co-op, has a small role in "TSBofG." Tsangari, who worked on "Slacker," like Linklater, is an independent cinematic innovator. She has taken the tools available to her and worked within their boundaries but in doing this she has pushed the boundaries to their utmost limitations and made them work on her behalf. Every film school student should be forced to watch "The Slow Business of Going." It should be a prerequisite before you are even allowed to touch the camera that you understand what Tsangari has done here. By this I don't mean to imply that the work is like a "student film" (exactly like "Slacker" wasn't a student film really). "The Slow Business of Going" is a real film that stands easily on it's own worth. It is a beautiful film.

I can't wait to see "The Slow Business of Going" again. The film is global but like it's director, it belongs to Austin. I will claim it as an Austin film. After all, it's finale was filmed at Lake Travis and several Austin people, like Kyle Henry and Bryan Poyser and Kanter worked on the film. Therefore, the film becomes this year's Austin film to root for. Thank you Miss Tsangari for birthing such a beautiful work. What a treasure!

Note:

Martinez has a scriptwriter's credit on the film.

Score by Tin Hat Trio and Mark Orton.

A song by Tom Waits is used in a dance segment.

It took Tsangari 5 years to shoot the film.

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