Irene Papas

Acting

Irene Papas

Born 1929-09-03 · Chiliomodi, Corinth, Greece

Irene Papas (Greek: Ειρήνη Παππά, born Eirini Lelekou (Greek: Ειρήνη Λελέκου), 3 September 1929 – 14 September 2022) was a Greek actress and singer who starred in over 70 films in a career spanning more than 50 years. She gained international recognition through such popular award-winning films as The Guns of Navarone (1961), Zorba the Greek (1964) and Z (1969). She was a powerful protagonist in films including The Trojan Women (1971) and Iphigenia (1977). She played the title roles in Antigone (1961) and Electra (1962). She had a fine singing voice, on display in the 1968 recording Songs of Theodorakis. Papas won Best Actress awards at the Berlin International Film Festival for Antigone and from the National Board of Review for The Trojan Women. Her career awards include the Golden Arrow Award in 1993 at Hamptons International Film Festival, and the Golden Lion Award in 2009 at the Venice Biennale. Description above from the Wikipedia article Irene Papas, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.

Acting credits

Captain Corelli's Mandolin poster
5.9

When a fisherman leaves to fight with the Greek army during World War II, his fiancée falls in love with the local Italian commander.

Captain Corelli's Mandolin

2001

The Guns of Navarone poster
7.3

A team of allied saboteurs are assigned an impossible mission: infiltrate an impregnable Nazi-held island and destroy the two enormous long-range field guns that prevent the rescue of 2,000 trapped British soldiers.

The Guns of Navarone

1961

Into the Night poster
6.5

Ed Okin used to have a boring life. He used to have trouble getting to sleep. Then one night, he met Diana. Now, Ed's having trouble staying alive.

Into the Night

1985

The Odyssey poster
7.6

After fighting in the Trojan War, Odysseus spends years trying to return home to Ithaca. [Theatrical version of the 1968 mini-series.]

The Odyssey

1969

The Message poster
7.1

In sixth-century Mecca, Prophet Muhammad receives his first revelation from God as a messenger. Three years later, he's not alone in his quest and publicly declares his prophecy. Muhammad is fought by Abu Sufian and his wife Hind, rulers of Mecca. Muhammad's followers are hunted and tortured but he continues his calling.

The Message

1976

The Trojan Women poster
6.2

In the aftermath of the Trojan Wars, Queen Hecuba takes stock of the defeated kingdom. Her son has been killed, and his widow, Andromache, is left to raise their son, Astyanax, alone. Hecuba's daughter, Cassandra, fears being enslaved by her Greek masters, while Helen of Troy risks being executed. Astyanax also becomes the focus of the Greeks' attention as the last male heir of the Trojan royal family.

The Trojan Women

1971

Erendira poster
6.1

While Erendira, a beautiful teenage girl, has a surreal mystical vision, her grandmother's house catches on fire and burns to the ground. Her grandmother holds Erendira responsible and, in order to extract restitution from the girl, forces her into prostitution. Erendira's surreal mystical experiences continue while her grandmother grows rich from exploiting her.

Erendira

1983

Don't Torture a Duckling poster
7.3

A reporter and a promiscuous young woman try to solve a series of child killings in a remote southern Italian town rife with superstition and a distrust of outsiders.

Don't Torture a Duckling

1972

Z poster
7.8

A prominent politician is murdered during a demonstration. The government and army are trying to suppress the truth, but a tenacious magistrate is determined not to let them get away with it.

Z

1969

Lion of the Desert poster
7.3

Resistance leader Omar Mukhtar opposes Italian colonization before World War II. The brutal guerrilla war against Italian General Rodolfo Graziani and the Fascist forces of Benito Mussolini highlights the struggle for Libyan independence and the harsh tactics utilised by the colonisers.

Lion of the Desert

1981

Anne of the Thousand Days poster
7.1

Henry VIII of England discards his wife, Katharine of Aragon, who has failed to produce a male heir, in favor of the young and beautiful Anne Boleyn.

Anne of the Thousand Days

1969

Zorba the Greek poster
7.5

An uptight English writer traveling to Crete on a matter of business finds his life changed forever when he meets the gregarious Alexis Zorba.

Zorba the Greek

1964

Bambina poster
4.9

In order to convince Raimonda, a wealthy noble woman, to finance his project for a holiday resort, Saverio gets engaged to Clotilde, her mentally-disturbed and sex-obsessed adolescent daughter. He plans to have her kidnapped and raped by an accomplice so she won't be a virgin anymore and he'll have an excuse to get out of the impending marriage. But what he doesn't plan is to fall in love with the girl...

Bambina

1974

Morceaux de Cannes poster
2.0

We thought we'd seen, read, and heard everything there was to see about the Cannes Film Festival, from the glitz and gossip to the scandals and censorship. And yet, Emmanuel Barnault's "Morceaux de Cannes" (Pieces of Cannes), by this leading expert on Italian and French cinema, convinces us otherwise. The third largest event in the world (after the Olympic Games and the FIFA World Cup) reveals its secrets only sparingly, as this film attests. The result of passionate research in the INA archives, these 52 minutes, without interviews or voice-over narration, string together rare and sometimes previously unseen footage. Taken together, they tell a surprising, original, and heartwarming story of the Festival. On the beach, on a street corner, in a restaurant, or in the privacy of a hotel room, these forgotten archives summon the greatest filmmakers, actors, and actresses of the last seventy years, from Jean Cocteau to David Lynch, for an anthology of the Festival's history.

Morceaux de Cannes

2021

Jacob poster
6.7

Isaac's son Jacob deprives his brother Esau of his birthright and has to flee for his life. He finds shelter with his uncle Laban, but is himself deceived. Finally, Jacob has to face both his uncle and brother.

Jacob

1994

The Brotherhood poster
6.1

The son of a powerful Mafia don comes home from his army service in Vietnam and wants to lead his own life, but family tradition, intrigues and powerplays involving his older brother dictate otherwise, and he finds himself being slowly drawn back into that world.

The Brotherhood

1968

Bouboulina poster
6.8

The life and action of Laskarina Bouboulina. Captain Lascarina decides to organize the revolution in Spetses and to participate herself, despite her double widowhood. In the struggle for the liberation of Greece, she gives all her property and fighting along with her lads.

Bouboulina

1959

Bloodline poster
4.9

A pampered heiress inherits her father's pharmaceutical empire when he dies in a suspicious accident, and soon finds herself surrounded by ruthless board members and grasping family members who will seemingly stop at nothing to profit.

Bloodline

1979

Iphigenia poster
7.0

The Greek army is about to set sail to a great battle, but the winds refuse to blow. Their leader, King Agamemnon, seeks to provide better food, but accidentally slays a sacred deer. His punishment from the gods, the sacrifice of his daughter Iphigenia.

Iphigenia

1977

Electra poster
7.0

Living in exile after the death of their father, the grown children of a murdered and usurped king converge to exact eye-for-an-eye revenge.

Electra

1962

The Moon-Spinners poster
5.8

Young English girl Nikky and her aunt arrive at the Moon-Spinners, a hotel on Crete, to a less than enthusiastic welcome. The coolness of the owner is only out-done by the surliness of her brother Stratos, recently back from London. But then there is nice English lad Mark to make friends with, at least until Stratos and his pal take a shot at him one night. When Nikky helps him hide she finds the Greeks are after her too.

The Moon-Spinners

1964

Theodora, Slave Empress poster
6.3

Teodora, a Roman courtesan and former slave girl, marries the Roman emperor Justinian and assumes the throne as Empress of Rome. But the divide between nobility and slave is too great. Teodora seeks justice for her people, and revolution and armed conflict erupt in both Byzantium and Rome.

Theodora, Slave Empress

1954

Chronicle of a Death Foretold poster
7.3

This suspenseful Italian crime drama is set in a Colombian river town and chronicles the series of events that led up to murder. Based on a novel by distinguished author Gabriel Garcia Marquez, the tale begins in the present as a middle-aged doctor returns to the village after a twenty-year absence to investigate the murder that occurred just before he left.

Chronicle of a Death Foretold

1987

Attila poster
5.4

Attila, the leader of the barbarian Huns and called by the Romans "The Scourge of God", sweeps onto the Italian peninsula, defeating all of the armies of Rome, until he and his men reach the gates of the city itself.

Attila

1954