The history of the Queen of Greek basketball, from the first post-war years until 2009.
Featuring:
Giorgos Amerikanos, Christos Zoupas, Giorgos Trontzos, Philippos Syrigos, Vangelis Fountoukidis, Vassilis Goumas, Minas Gekos, Yannis Ioannidis, Bane Prelević and Nikos Hatzis.
Cinematography:
Claudio Bolivar
Sound:
Dimitris Kanellopoulos
Associate producer:
Yannis Vikias
Archivist:
Akis Papadopoulos
Scripts / Narration:
Konstantinos Kamaras
Screenplay / Historical Documentation / Directed by
Elias Giannakakis
Like in the case of the respective football documentary in the series, here again emotion is overflowing.
The reasons are numerous.
The main one is the great team of the 60s, which won the first European trophy Greece has ever own.
We filmed Amerikanos and Zoupas at the Panathenaic Stadium. The footage is very touching and is edited in cross-cutting with the ‘tall’ Giorgos Trontzos and Philippos Syrigos, who even though he features in all Basketball episodes, this one was special since the 60s AEK was his favorite team. The reason behind his involvement with basketball.
And of course, we could not do without the voice of Georgiou, even though he could not make it for the filming.
Luckily, there was enough vintage newsreel available, which paired with his voice brings the glorious history of the 60s AEK to life.
Goumas and Gekos discuss the hard years that followed, culminating in the 1981 Cup and the heroic Rampidis, and the team between 1995 and 2002.
The team of Philippou, coached by Ioannidis first, Ivkovic later, and finally Sakotas, made it to the Final in the Euroleague, in 1998, got two Greek Cups in 2000 and 2001 and the Cup Winners’ Cup, in 2000 (after 32 years) and, of course, won the unforgettable championship in 2002 with the great turnaround.
Yannis Ioannidis, Bane Prelević and of course the current, emblematic captain, Nikos Hatzis, discuss those great achievements.
I will never forget Giorgos Amerikanos, who went through the filming with unbearable knee pains. He could not stay upright and he signaled to warn me that he was going to fall.
In the end, he made it; once again.
Eleftherotypia
