Τρίτη 28 Μαΐου 2013

Olympiacos repeats as Euroleague champion! - Πρωταθλητής Ευρώπης ο Ολυμπιακός





For the second year in a row, Olympiacos Piraeus roared back from a double-digit deficit to become the Turkish Airlines Euroleague champion. The Reds bested Real Madrid 100-88 at The O2 in London after trailing by 17 at the end of the opening quarter and in doing so became just the fourth team to win back-to-back Euroleague titles in the Final Four era. In something that has become characteristic of the Reds, they got tremendous contributions from their second unit, led by Kyle Hines and Pero Antic, to climb back. Then Euroleague MVP Vassilis Spanoulis heated up in the third quarter and Olympiacos dominated the final 10 minutes as thousands of red-clad fans sang and clapped the night away. Euroleague MVP Vassilis Spanoulis led the charge with 21 points – all in the second half! – as six Olympiacos players scored in double figures. Acie Law collected 20 points and dished 5 assists, Hines added 12 points, Kostas Sloukas 11 and Stratos Perperoglou and Antic scored 10 apiece. The title is the third continental crown in Olympiacos’s illustrious history. Before beating CSKA Moscow last season in Istanbul, it defeated FC Barcelona in the 1997 title game in Rome. Rudy Fernandez led Madrid with 21 points, Sergio Rodriguez scored 17 and Sergio Llull finished with 14. Madrid lost its first final since it defeated the Reds in the 1995 Euroleague final in Zaragoza, Spain, but remains European basketball’s winningest team with eight Euroleague titles.



Τετάρτη 8 Μαΐου 2013

Toronto Film Festival Heads To Athens For Fifth City-To-City Program / Η Αθήνα τιμώμενη πόλη στο Φεστιβάλ Κινηματογράφου του Τορόντο




Toronto Film Festival Heads To Athens For Fifth City-To-City Program



The Toronto International Film Festival is going to Athens this year in the fifth edition of the festival's City to City program.

Cameron Bailey, Artistic Director of the Festival, and Dimitri Eipides, International Programmer for the Festival, announced today that the Greek city will be the focus of the 2013 program.

“City to City looks for cinematic hot spots around the world," said Bailey. “We want to introduce our audience to new generations of filmmakers unafraid to rewrite the rules. When we started thinking about the startlingly original films emerging recently from this ancient and contemporary city, the perfect choice for us this year was Athens."

“After a long period of hibernation, Greek cinema has finally found its way back to the forefront. A number of young filmmakers — most of them fresh out of film school or, at best, with a couple of shorts to their name — turned things around. Where others saw devastation, they saw inspiration,” said Eipides. “Working with minimal means, often exchanging services on each other’s productions, they churned out films which gained attention around the world. Hopefully this new wave of international exposure will give Greek cinema the confidence to communicate its message from a position where national boundaries will no longer matter.”

The City to City series "showcases filmmakers living and working in a selected city, regardless of where their films are set." Cities featured in past programmes include Tel Aviv, Istanbul, Buenos Aires and Mumbai.

The announcement of the City to City lineup will be made in July.  The 38th Toronto International Film Festival runs from September 5 to 15, 2013.

Τρίτη 7 Μαΐου 2013

Satire and laughs at World Press Cartoon / Έλληνας ο νικητής στον Παγκόσμιο Διαγωνισμό Γελοιογραφίας




Satire and laughs at World Press Cartoon



The World Press Cartoon 2013 carries the scars of the financial crisis – not in quality but in the themes chosen.

Sponsorship was also hit by the crisis this year with some companies abandoning the annual event in Sintra in Portugal. So it wasn’t surprising that the Grand Prix, the first prize, in the editorial category went to a crisis-themed cartoon by Greek artist Kountouris.

He said: “I dedicate it to the victims of the crisis and I wish that very soon we can have the Europe we all want, the Europe which cares about the people and not the banks.”

More than 500 press cartoons published in 63 countries were shown in Sintra.
The forum has been running for nine years. Portugal will hold municipal elections in the autumn. The current mayor of Sintra have said they will not stand again, but both he and the director of the cartoon forum are reluctant to contemplate the end of the World Press Cartoon forum.

Mayor Fernando Seara said: “I will continue to come to Sintra to visit future World Press Cartoons. I think they’ll be a good bet with more and more participants and a growing global interest.” Director Antonio Antunes added: “I think that World Press Cartoon is going to become a really strong event that is not over. The next mayor of Sintra will also want to continue with World Press Cartoon. At the least I would be moderately optimistic.”

Prizes are given in three categories – editorial, humorous drawing and caricature. The humour this year came from Iranian artist Saeed Sedeghi, who explained the premise: “It is a satire about civil law in which it says – compared to some individuals who do not observe the law – some animals seem to be more law-abiding.”