Kyuka: Before Summer’s End

The first day of the summer is the sea. The last is the moon.

They paint their nails pink, eat pasta for dinner and enjoy endless Greek sunshine. What could be better than a summer spent on a yacht with your favourite people? Elsa and Konstantinos are twins in their late teens. Living on a boat, they help their father with the fish, make casual friends on the island and have a carefree time. Their single dad Babis, along with struggling with fishing, reflects on his past relationship with Anna, the twins’ mother, who left them when they were just babies. 

The film was selected for ACID 2024 at Cannes and is the director's debut feature film. Kostis Charamountanis is a young, self-taught Greek filmmaker, and Kyuka: Before Summer’s End is the continuation of his trilogy dedicated to nostalgia for summer (first short film Kioku Before Summer Comes contains footage with the actors starred in ‘Kyuka’). In Japanese, the word ‘kyuka’ means holidays, absence from work, and this motif becomes overarching for Charamountannis’s films, through which he explores themes of coming-of-age, inner crises and the delicate subject of family relations.

 Kyuka: Before Summer’s End, (Charamountanis, 2024).

At first glance, Kyuka: Before Summer’s End may seem to be a simple story that captures one summer in an aesthetically pleasing manner, praising hedonism and exploiting beautiful Greek landscapes. However, defying expectations, the movie escapes pretentious romanticism: alongside being visually appealing, it delves into exploring intimacy of human relations and other deeper themes. The film discusses crises of self-identification and regrets of the past, through the metaphor of fishing and Babis’s relation to fish. It touches on the issue of toxic masculinity that haunts both male characters, preventing them from fully accepting themselves. 

Parenting is also a cross-cutting theme that is shown from two distant perspectives. On the one hand there is Anna, who regrets missing moments of her kids' life and at the same time is afraid to show up now, not knowing how they might react. Babis on the other hand is not satisfied with his own self and always transfers his insecurities onto children, nudging them not to waste time 

on useless activities.

The most vivid line of the film is, of course, the relationship between the twins. There is a special chemistry between the actors Elsa Lekakou and Konstantinos Georgopoulos: I would imagine them being siblings in real life. Their little quarrels and pokes are so real, and despite everything their love and support for each other is palpable no matter what. Not only are they twins, but they are friends. 

Although characters’ feelings and relationships are not over-explained and some details remain unspoken, the film is very good in demonstrating the ideas and meanings it intends to convey. Charamountanis is not afraid to experiment with various cinematic techniques, from music choice to editing. Some of his decisions may appear unexpected, but nevertheless they are incredibly accurate in representing different issues and depicting character’s emotional states.

This way, the second half of the film adopts many creative editing solutions. In different scenes the video sequence incorporates still images and freeze frames, use cut repetition, or is supplemented by some archival footage with characters’ voices overlapping. The film uses countless approaches that you, as a viewer, do not expect. My favourite scene is when Babis, after a desperate monologue about his crisis in fishing, arrange a fish ‘haul’, taking fish from the bucket one by one and showing them to the camera, looking directly into a lens.

 Kyuka: Before Summer’s End, (Charamountanis, 2024).

Along with documenting Elsa and Konstantinos’ casual interactions and their family routines, the film somehow manages to incorporate theatrically staged frames and tragedy-like dialogues, that at the same time reveal the dramatic part of the story and keep the comedic style of the narrative intact. The film's near-square format enhances the film's summer-nostalgia effect, reminiscent of footage shot on a hand-held camera during a family holiday. 

The choice of music also contributes a lot to the overall impression of the film. Again, it is not always predictable, but it is always very complimentary and narrative in itself. Starting with Tchaikovsky's composition in the opening scene, when the family first moves onto the boat, or the disturbing choral singing that accompanies Babis's tense reflections on his relationship with Anna and the resentments left behind. The slower episodes, when characters are just sunbathing or talking to a turtle, are complemented by dreamy, calm music that gives you a feeling of warmth, freedom and peace that you can only experience in summer.

 Kyuka: Before Summer’s End, (Charamountanis, 2024).