MURDERESS (THE)


View at Tainiothiki tis Ellados
  • Other title(s): MURDERESSES (THE)
    LES PETITES FILLES ET LA MORT
  • Genre: Feature Film
  • Year: 1974
  • Description: Fragkogiannou (Maria Alkaiou), a hard-done by, deranged woman after a life full of hardship, recalls the past by her newborn girl grandchild’s crib. Her mother was a wicked woman and one of her sons was a criminal. Lost in a haze, she strangles the baby as she is concvinced that girls can cause their family only trouble. Later, she lets a little girl drown in a well, while she drowns three other little girls, one of whom is a newborn baby. This is her way of sparing children and parents of the inevitable suffering in life. The police pursue her and she perishes in the sea
    1. AMERSA’S DREAM Amersa’s dream (forward traveling). It is psychedelic with bright colors (blue, orange): the bend over figure of an old woman walking stealthily while a fire is burning. The girl jumps up from her sleep in terror. (A ROOM)
    10. FRAGKOGIANNOU ASKS GOD FOR FORGIVENESS Fragkogiannou enters a country church, crosses herself and asks for forgiveness. (A COUNTRY CHURCH)
    11. THE CHORES IN THE YARD Fragkogiannou’s daughter draws water from the well, while her mother does the washing in a washtub, in a big yard. The daughter starts to wash, too. (THE YARD)
    12. THE CHILDREN'S PLAY AND XENOULA'S DROWNING A swarm of children storm into the yard. The girls, who are in the majority, skip and hopscotch. They run around barefoot, chasing one another. Fragkogiannou does the washing in the tub and watches them. Then, the children go away. The sun gets hotter. Fragkogiannou sends Krinio, her little daughter, off to lunch. There one little girl called Xenoula left behind in the yard, trying to hopscotch like the older girls do. The little girl leans over the well and looks down. Fragkogiannou is watching, talking to herself and secretly wishing the little one fell over into the well and set her mother free. The girl falls into the well. The old woman walks up to the well and looks down. She seems satisfied. She takes off her apron and walks off. (THE YARD)
    13. FRAGKOGIANNOU REMEMBERS HER MOTHER (Shots in shades of yellow). All by herself, Fragkogiannou gazes out at the sea and remembers her mother. Then we see Fragkogiannou's mother, alone on the shore, looking out at the sea. Fragkogiannou recalls her mother's account of the time when Karatasos' bandits were after her, because business was bad and they blamed it all on her magic spells she had cast on them. Her mother the old hag, a young girl at the time, ran barefoot with the bandits in hot pursuit of her, when all of a sudden they lost track her and she vanished in the thin air. (THE SEASHORE - VARIOUS LANDSCAPES)
    14. IN THE YARD, AFTER LITTLE XENOULA'S DROWNING A crowd of people have gathered at the yard, among them children with their lips sealed and policemen. At first, drowned Xenoula's mother is heard in the distance singing dirges about the dead. The magistrate is talking with the policeman in private. They call Fragkogiannou, who tells them that the children were playing together since that morning, making a lot of noise; then she sent Krinio to get some food. Soon after that, she left the yard herself, fed up with the strong sun. When she came back, the children were gone. She sent Katia to the well to get some water for rinsing the clothes. That was when she found little Xenoula floating in the water. (THE YARD)
    15. FRAGKOGIANNOU TALKS WITH MAROUSO Fragkogiannou is with her well-off niece Marouso, in the latter's garden, talking to her about Delcharo's baby's death. Then, she tells her about her troubles. At first she served her parents, then she slaved for her husband and children, and now she is slaving for her grandchildren. Her mother was a real bitch and did not provide her with a decent dowry. Then she refers to her seven children, all of them gone their own separate ways. She comes to the conclusion that children not only suffer themselves, but also make their parents suffer. Worst of all are the girls, who shoulder the burden of the institution of the dowry in cash. She says in particular: " Too bad! If they are girls is better to strangle them". She beefs about her working hard as weaver, midwife, nurse adn weed collector. She turned nasty with the neighbours, they taxed her, she was fined and she she ate the salted bread of her sweat (flashback in yellow). She says that if you don't provide with dowry, you remain with your daughter put on the shelf, in the closet. She remember telleing Amersa that she 'll go to bedside Delharo's baby. She comes back into the present. " So it died, but what's the matter. She was a girl". (MAROUSO'S YARD – THE STREETS IN THE VILLAGE - FRAGKOGIANNOU'S YARD)
    16. FRAGKOGIANNOU GAZES OUT Fragkogiannou, a basket in hand, gazes out at nature (A FIELD)
    17. THE GIRLS' DROWNING We see a forest and Fragkogiannou walking alone, holding her basket. In the yard of an empty farmhouse, she sees two little girls playing by themselves by the walls of a cistern full of water. She walks up to them and asks about their parents. The two girls, Mesouda and Toula, reply that their parents are away. Their mother is not there and their father is working further down. Fragkogiannou looks around to make sure nobody is watching, puts her basket down, walks right up to them, strokes the back of their head as if to bless them and pushes them into the cistern. They drown and their bodies float in the water. Fragkogiannou picks up her basket and walks off with a wicked smile on her face. Then, she shouts at the girls' mother stepping outside in the yard in her nightdress, scolding her for not having kept an eye on her children. In the meantime, she makes out that she is struggling with all her might to pull the children out of the cistern. She tells the mother to roll the children over and starts shouting at the girls' father who comes running from the fields. The girls' mother faints. In front of the father's eyes, Fragkogiannou pretends to be making great efforts to save them, but to no avail. (A FOREST - AN EMPTY FARMHOUSE - A CISTERN)
    18. MOURTOS STABS HIS SISTER (Flashback in a shade of yellow). Mourtos is running away from the police chasing him and takes shelter in the house. He climbs with astonishing agility through a secret trapdoor from the basement to the first floor where his sister Amersa is by herself. The police break down the door and storm the basement. They find several weapons kept there by Mourtos, who watches them from above with his sister. The police are going up the stairs, when they hear Amersa scream. Her brother has stabbed her in the back. Mourtos slips out through the trapdoor, and out of reach of the police. Amersa manages to hide her brother's knife away and fakes a fever. Fragkogiannou comes round in a rush and asks the police not to cause her son too much pain when they catch him. When the police are gone, Fragkogiannou notices the blood on Amersa's white dress. (FRAGKOGIANNOU'S HOUSE)
    19. THE INTERROGATION ABOUT THE DROWNING The magistrate and his escorts arrive at the garden of the small house where the little girls were murdered. The question the children's father and Fragkogiannou, who claims that she entered the farm to give some herbs to the girls' father for his sick wife, when she heard the sound of the children hitting the water. Yelling out again, she goes preaching at the devastated father. The policeman and the magistrate talk in a whisper. (THE YARD AT THE FARMHOUSE)
    2. OPENING TITLES OPENING TITLES)
    20. FRAGKOGIANNOU IS THE PRIME SUSPECT The police captain and two respectable men, rather advanced in years, smoke hookah pipe and talk about Mourtos, Fragkogiannou's son, who is in jail in Chalkis for stabbing a fellow villager. A little girl brings them some food. One of the men makes fun the magistrate who, searching for "substantial evidence" has let Fragkogiannou free to go about killing children. He is certain it is the old woman who kills them. The captain agrees and adds that it was the magistrate who did not let him put her under arrest. (AN OUTDOOR SPACE)
    21. FRAGKOGIANNOU AT MAROUSO'S BASEMENT Fragkogiannou is kneading. Krinio notices two policemen near the house and calls her mother. Fragkogiannou is upset and tells her that they are after her to put her in prison and that she must seek shelter in the mountains. Krinio wants to know the reason why, but she evades her question. She hurriedly packs various things in a basket, picks up the stick and crosses herself. She instructs Krinio to act out a scene with her sister to make the police believe their mother is ill and bed ridden. She sneaks out of the back door and goes to Marouso's, who will hide her in the basement for the night. When it dawns, she will have to go wherever the road takes her. If she has nowhere to go the following evening, she will throw a small stone at her window to let her in. Fragkogiannou stays in the basement and sends her niece to report back on the police whereabouts. (MAROUSO'S BASEMENT - STREETS OF THE VILLAGE – FRAGKOGIANNOU'S HOUSE)
    22. FRAGKOGIANNOU'S WANDERINGS AND THE MEETING WITH THE SHEPHERD Fragkogiannou wanders alone around the fields. The sun sets. She picks up some greens and goes past two children playing, but pays no attention to them. Next, she is in Marouso's basement. Early in the morning, she looks out of the window and sees someone approaching. She panics and runs away. She is still on the run, when she comes across a shepherd. Perceiving her as possessing extraordinary magical powers and capable of concocting herbal remedies, the shepherd tells her that his third newborn girl won't suck her mother's breast, and that his wife is in confinement and ill. Just then, it scared her to notice two policemen patrolling the fields. She promises the shepherd that if she shakes them off, she will come around his place in the evening and asks him not to tell them on her. She takes to her heels. The shepherd tries to cover up her tracks, but to no avail. (PASTURELAND AND FIELDS – MAROUSO'S BASEMENT)
    23. FRAGKOGIANNOU AND THE BANDITS Fragkogiannou picks some more greens, gazes out at the sea and hides in a cave in a mountain, where she falls asleep. Some time later, three bandits show up and accuse her of getting the police out to their territory, the mountains. She evades the question whether she drowned the little girls or not. The bandits happen to know his son Mourtos. When they sit down to smoke, Fragkogiannou draws on the pipe with them, while one of the bandits plays the baglama. When he stops playing, he gives her a knife. (A FIELD - A CAVE - THE SEASHORE)
    24. THE STRANGULATION OF THE SHEPHERD'S NEWBORN In the evening, true to her word, Fragkogiannou calls on the shepherd's wife in confinement to treat her. She finds his mother-in-law and explains to her that Giannis has sent her. In the hut, she concocts her herbal remedies. She stresses that "girls are born to the poor" and "the woman is a slave". She talks again about her parents, Fragkos, her late husband, her children, the dowries that she had to provide her daughters with and the trouble her grandchildren have given her. The other old woman, the shepherd's mother-in-law, has a stoical outlook on life and is not resentful, since she regards everything as "an act of providence". Fragkogiannou gives the woman in confinement her herbal remedy and tells her to go to sleep. There is a man calling the girl's mother and she goes out. Then she comes back in and dozes off in front of the newborn's crib. Making out that she arranges the baby's bed covers, Fragkogiannou strangles the baby in its crib. Grandmother wakes up and Fragkogiannou rushes outside. Just as grandmother starts screaming and cursing, the murderess runs away. Further down she comes across the shepherd, who is worried at the screaming. Fragkogiannou makes up a story on the fly that the shepherd's wife has another baby coming and urges him to rush and get the midwife. She would supposedly go and fetch a priest to pronounce a blessing on his wife. Caught on the act for the first time, the old woman goes away as fast as she can. (YANNIS HOUSE – FIELDS AND PASTURE LAND)
    25. FRAGKOGIANNOU'S PURSUIT AND DROWNING Policemen and farmers are in pursuit of Fragkogiannou. For the duration of the scene, the narrator talks about Fragkogiannou and her life (flashback shots in shades of yellow) and feelings while she is being chased by the police: "She knew they would have no mercy on her. They have arrived. The police are here. Her position was betrayed or they tracked her down". After a long chase, the murderess comes to the edge of the sea, knowing that her pursuers would have no mercy on her. She turns and faces them, holding the knife the bandit had given her. She remembers Xenoula hopscotching. She drops the knife. She goes into the sea and keeps going deeper and deeper until she is covered in water. Her pursuers gathered at the seashore watch Fragkogiannou disappearing into the sea. We see shots of the mother, at a young age, at the seashore. Then back again to the murderess's pursuers. (FIELDS - THE SEASHORE)
    26. THE END The beach is now empty. Fragkogiannou's basket and stick are lying unattended by the sea. (THE SEASHORE)
    3. AMERSA TELLS HER MOTHER THE DREAM Amersa (about 17) wakes with a start, as if from a nightmare. She gets out of bed and goes to her sister's Delcharo to find her mother there. She says in alarm that she saw in her sleep her sister's newly born baby was dead. Fragkogiannou reassures her and sends her back home. Krinio will scream if she wakes up and Amersa is not there. Fragkogiannou doesn't want to go back home. "We'll see about it tomorrow", she tells her daughter and as she bolts the door memories rush back in. (FRAGKOGIANNOU'S HOUSE - DELCHAROU'S HOUSE)
    4. FRAGOS' S WEDDING TO CHADOULA (Flashback in a shade of yellow). Giannis Fragkos and his parents make the final arrangements for his wedding to Chadoula. The girl tries to hide her bitterness from her parents, who have provided her with a waste plot of land and an "empty house for her dowry ". She excuses herself from her company, slips into the other room and takes some of the silver coins her mother the "shrew" has been saving and puts the rest away. It is as if she makes her mother pay for her callousness when, on the eve of her wedding day, she embezzles a small amount from the capital that "the unfeeling woman had raised over many years, robbing Chadoula's father of his money". She never told her mother about the theft, not even before she died. (CHADOULA'S PARENTAL HOUSE)
    5. FRAGKOGIANNOU'S PRAYER Fragkogiannou stands in front of the icon of Virgin Mary with the candle and crosses herself (FRAGKOGIANNOU'S HOUSE)
    6. MOURTOS (Flashback in a shade of yellow). Mourtos, Fragkogiannou's son, a confirmed anarchist, after detonating a bomb, is running away from the police. Making haste, he runs into her mother, who tries to stop him, and knocks her over. He hides in the house. Suddenly there is a scream from the house; it's his sister Amersa. Before she lets the police in, the girl hides a blood stained knife. Mourtos knocks down a policeman and runs away. After recalling the past, Fragkogiannou turns away from the icon stand and goes to the other room. (Fragkogiannou's yard and yard – Village streets – Fields)
    7. THE FIRST MURDER Delcharo, who is in confinement and sleeps behind a makeshift partition made of planks, asks her mother about her newborn daughter. The baby is being looked after by her grandmother Fragkogiannou. Shorty before dawn, Amers arrives at her sister's in confinement and talks worriedly to her mother about the dream she had. Her mother reassures her and sends her away, just when the cock crows. She bolts the door, crosses herself and bends over the baby's crib. She places the palm of her hand over the baby's face and chokes it in a twist. At the same time, she recalls her unruly son and his trouble with the police. The screen goes red over Fragkogiannou's face and she stares down her hand in horror and disgust. (Delcharo's house)
    8. XENOULA A little girl hopscotches in the yard of a household. In the distance, we can make out a well. The girl leans over and looks down. (A big yard with a well)
    9. DELCHARO LEARNS ABOUT HER BABY'S DEATH Fragkogiannou is still at her daughter's in confinement. Konstantis, Delcharo's husband, is getting ready to go to work at the shipyard. There is a loud noise as he picks up his tool and dumps them in the bag. When Delcharo wakes up she is told that their baby is dead. Fortunately, they had had it baptized. Now, they must send word to her sisters, Amersa and Krinio. Konstantis is on his way. (Delcharo's house)
  • Keywords: ΠΑΙΔΙΑ ΧΩΡΟΦΥΛΑΚΕΣ ΠΗΓΑΔΙ ΘΑΛΑΣΣΑ ΔΑΣΟΣ / CHILDREN POLICE WELL SEA FOREST / ΠΑΙΔΙΑ ΧΩΡΟΦΥΛΑΚΕΣ ΠΗΓΑΔΙ ΘΑΛΑΣΣΑ ΔΑΣΟΣ / CHILDREN POLICE WELL SEA FOREST
  • Provider: Tainiothiki tis Ellados
  • Production company: SEMELI FILMS
  • Director: FERRIS KOSTAS
  • Collection: Ψηφιοποιημένες ελληνικές ταινίες μυθοπλασίας