QUICK AND DIRTY: LIVE FROM TALLINN

The year is 1995, and the action takes place in Greece,. Shy and handsome 18-year-old Argyris (played confidently by Albanian-born and Greek-raised Claudio Kaya) meets the beautiful Mary (Konstantina Messini) in a massage parlour. The woman happily broadens her job spec to include a hand job. There’s a spark of romance inside his trousers, and also up in the air. So Mary invites her client to spend the weekend with her parents, pretending that he’s her boyfriend. He accepts the invitation, immediately trusting her vaguely suspicious and yet strangely comforting smile. Saturday at 14:00 the three people show up in order to pick him up as planned. They arrive in a very modern and luxurious house in the middle of the woods. A gorgeous and yet somehow oppressive environment. The ensuing developments as peculiar as Mary’s invitation.

Mary’s hyper nosy and controlling parents George (Giorgos Liantos) and Sandra (Evelina Papoulia) seek to investigate every aspect of their guest’s life, particularly the details of how they met. The middle-aged woman is a psychologist specialised in behaviourism. She used to run horrific tests on animals (particularly unsuspecting macaques), until those were outlawed roughly a decade earlier, in the 1980s. Real footage of the experiments dot the entire movie. The man is a paediatrician. They both have very unorthodox medical techniques, which they are keen to apply Argyris. It all starts out with some innocent dancing and box-ticking, gradually morphing into more Mengelian practices.

Sandra explains that one of the most common animal experiments consisted of making ravenous macaques choose between a fluffy puppet and food. They almost invariably always opted for the furry toy, in evidence that these creatures – just like us human beings – desperately crave love. The first not-so-voluntary experiment consists of making Argyris dance on a raised platform with a tiger printed on the background. Then jumping in a seemingly empty swimming pool. Allegory or hallucination? Either way, charmingly eerie. Other tasks include multiple choice questions. The two devoted doctors take notes, and then tick each item in a long list of qualities with a minus of a plus: “humour”, “intuition, “sense of humour”, “courage”, “integrity”, “energy”, “self’-control”, and so on. They want to dissect the psychology of their guest in more ways than one. The large house becomes an animal cage.

Mary confides to Argyris that her parents may have conducted experiments on her when she was a child, leaving permanent physical and psychological sequels on her. At one point, she shakes uncontrollably. Drug-induced convulsion or epileptic fit? The real nature of her malaise is as blurry as her allegiances. Despite the dangers and uncertainties, Argyris continues to trust her. In fact, he chooses to offer her shelter and protection (in the metaphorical sense, as their weekend almost entirely confined to the house).

Dennis Iliadis’s buzzy new film is absurd and unpredictable, with a clever little twist in the end. It’s mostly fun to watch, with strong performances, colourful lights and funky settings, and a subtle music score. It all wraps up neatly to a 21st century female rendition of Robert Palmer’s Johnny and Mary. Buzzheart is an undisputed child of the Greek Weird Wave, with sinister symbolisms, surreal devices, and an atmosphere oscillating between the dreamy and the nightmarish. And don’t worry: you won’t fall sleep!

Buzzheart just premiered in the Official Competition of the 28th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival.