A new Skopje film titled "Mocking of Christ" attempts to accuse Greece of “ethnic cleansing” of its people.
The film has in fact been criticised by FYROM’s current Prime Minister Zoran Zaev, who is in the midst of trying to convince Parliament to back his new name deal with Greece, with Zaev going as far as trying to ban it. However, it has the full support of FYROM’s President Gjorge Ivanov, who is opposed to the new name "North Macedonia," and any compromise with Greece.
According to the film’s script, the main character Alexander Philippopoulos is a prominent journalist of a French political magazine who returns to his hometown in northern Greece, seeking the truth about his father, Lazaros, who lived as a political refugee in Skopje after the Civil War. The film presents a Skopjian argument against Greece, claiming the extinction of FYROMians after the Second World War and there are also strong reports against the Albanian Skopje community.
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The central hero is murdered, by being crucified on a map of Greece under a construction motorway in northern Greece, showing "Macedonia being separated into two," blaming Greece for division and murder.
In promotional material for the film, the director is quoted as saying, “Alexander comes into contact with a group of anarchists who are preparing terrorist attacks in order to draw attention to the Macedonian issue in Greece. The anarchists, driven by the heroic stories of his father Lazar, expect Alexander to join them. Alexander refuses and faces terror. This is how his tragedy begins and the end of the journey that will take him to Skopje, Macedonia, where he will truly meet his father Lazar.”
Greek actors were cast in the film and there were also scenes filmed in Athens, Thessaloniki, and Florina, which according to the end titles had the support of the Athens Ministry.
"Mocking of Christ," directed by Yani Bozatzi, recently competed in the Montreal Film Festival and appeared as a film from "Macedonia."