10 Best Movies Set in or About Greece

10 Movies Set in or About Greece

Foreign-led films whose sustained setting or subject remains centered on Greece.

1. 

   1. Zorba the Greek

   Alexis Zorbas · 1964

   A buttoned-up English writer arrives in Crete to reopen a mine and befriends the exuberant, life-devouring Alexis Zorba, whose earthy wisdom and appetite for living gradually transform him. A beloved, soulful classic.

   Why & details

   Curator’s note: The essential outsider encounter with modern Greece: an English writer arrives in Crete and experiences the island’s work, music, ritual, hardship, and appetite for life through Zorba.

2. 

   2. Before Midnight

   2013

   Nine years after they reunited, Jesse and Celine, now a couple with twin daughters, spend a bittersweet summer holiday in Greece where a long, honest conversation exposes the fault lines in their relationship. Richard Linklater's tender, talky romance.

3. 

   3. 300

   2007

   In 480 BC, King Leonidas leads three hundred Spartan warriors to make a legendary last stand against the vast invading army of the Persian king Xerxes at the pass of Thermopylae. Zack Snyder's stylized, hyperkinetic battle spectacle.

   Why & details

   Curator’s note: A foreign, English-language mythic rendering of Leonidas and the Spartan stand at Thermopylae, with ancient Greek history and identity as its sustained subject.

4. 

   4. The Guns of Navarone

   1961

   A team of Allied commandos undertakes a near-impossible mission: to infiltrate a fortified Greek island and destroy the massive Nazi guns that trap thousands of British troops. A grand, suspenseful World War II adventure.

   Why & details

   Curator’s note: A World War II mission story set around a fictional Greek island in the Aegean campaign.

5. 

   5. Mediterraneo

   1991

   During World War II, a ragtag squad of Italian soldiers is posted to a tiny, seemingly deserted Greek island, where the war fades away and they fall under the spell of the place and its people. A warm, wistful, Oscar-winning comedy-drama.

   Why & details

   Curator’s note: Greek Sea, World War II. An Italian ship leaves a handful of soldiers in a little island; their mission is to spot enemy ships and to hold the island in case of attack. The village of the island seems abandoned and there isn't a single enemy in sight, so the soldiers begin to relax a little. Things change when their ship is hit and destroyed by the enemy, and the soldiers find themselves abandoned there.

6. 

   6. Jason and the Argonauts

   1963

   To reclaim his throne, the hero Jason gathers a crew of legendary adventurers and sails in search of the fabled Golden Fleece, facing gods, giants, and monsters along the way. A classic fantasy adventure famed for its stop-motion effects.

   Why & details

   Curator’s note: An English-language outsider adaptation of the Greek Argonautica whose sustained world, characters, and quest come directly from Greek mythology.

7. 

   7. The Two Colonels

   I due colonnelli · 1962

   In occupied Greece during World War II, an Italian colonel and his English counterpart develop a grudging, comic friendship that is tested as the tides of war shift around them. A wartime comedy.

8. 

   8. Ulysses

   Ulisse · 1954

   After the fall of Troy, the wandering hero Ulysses battles monsters, sorcery, and the wrath of the gods across the Mediterranean in his long, perilous struggle to return home to his faithful wife. A colorful adaptation of Homer's Odyssey.

   Why & details

   Curator’s note: An Italian-language adaptation of Homer’s Odyssey that treats Ithaca, Odysseus, and the foundational Greek homecoming myth as its complete narrative world.

9. 

   9. Mamma Mia!

   2008

   On a sun-drenched Greek island, a bride-to-be secretly invites three of her mother's old flames to her wedding, hoping to discover which one is her father — all set to the songs of ABBA. A giddy, feel-good musical.

   Why & details

   Curator’s note: A Greek-island musical fantasy whose setting and tourism image are central to its story world.

10. 

    10. Eyjafjallajökull

    2013

    When the Icelandic volcano erupts and grounds flights across Europe, a bitterly divorced couple is forced to travel together by any means necessary to reach their daughter's wedding in a Greek village. A frantic French road-trip comedy.