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MATI

By Daphne SCHMON

Thriller - Pre-Production 2019

A young widow travels back to a Greek island to spread her husband's ashes; upon learning the true nature of what may have claimed his life, she is tempted by a dark choice that could bring him back.

- Year of production
- 2019
- Genres
- Thriller, First film, Drama
- Countries
- UNITED KINGDOM, GREECE
- Languages
- ENGLISH, GREEK
- Budget
- N/A
- Duration
- 90 mn
- Director(s)
- Daphne SCHMON
- Writer(s)
- Emily CARLTON
- Producer(s)
- Melanie DICKS (Handsome Films)
- Synopsis
- When Diana’s husband Felix is tragically and unexpectedly killed, she travels back to the Greek island of Corfu to scatter his ashes. Heavy rainfall beats against the rocky coastline as Diana makes her way to a village the couple had visited together, an omen of the dark and otherworldly things to come.
  Soon after arriving, Diana helps an elderly widow called ‘Kouraki’ (crow) to catch and slaughter a runaway lamb, and something shifts inside of her. Kouraki practices a twisted form of ‘Kako Mati’ (the Evil Eye). Recognising Diana’s pain, Kouraki offers her a heartbreaking choice – bring back her husband, by ending someone else’s life. At first, Diana is sceptical, but when she discovers that the family she's staying with cast the Eye onto Felix shortly before he died - to save their sick child - she becomes convinced they are responsible for his death. As her mental state deteriorates and the world around her seems to grow stranger Diana becomes bent on revenge. But her attempts to kill the woman she holds responsible goes terribly wrong and she inadvertently puts a child's life in danger.
  Diana watches the child fight for his life as the Eye takes its price. Ashamed and scared, she tries to reverse her choice but there is only one way to end the dark curse: she must gouge out her own eye.
  Distraught, Diana is no longer sure what is real and what is not. In an epic and excruciating finale, she commits this act of visceral personal sacrifice to undo what she’s done. She's left haunted by the experience, but able to accept Felix's death. By giving up a part of herself, she is finally able to let him go.