Papadopoulos & Söhne (Papadopoulos & Sons)
U.K. 2012

Opening 27 Jun 2013

Directed by: Marcus Markou
Writing credits: Marcus Markou
Principal actors: Stephen Dillane, Ed Stoppard, Georgia Groome, Frank Dillane, Georgina Leonidas

Harry Papadopoulos (Stephen Dillane) is a Greek-immigrant success story. With his children – ages 7, 16 and 18 – the young widower lives a privileged life in a posh English neighborhood – all afforded by the food and real-estate empire he built from scratch. Honored as the ‘Entrepreneur of the Year’ one day, it all ‘goes to pot’ the next, when his heavily leveraged business collapses in a UK bank crash. Out of his gazillions he is left with only 25K in cash and a ramshackle Fish & Chips restaurant that has been closed for years and that he co-owns with his estranged brother Spiros (Georges Corraface). Predictably he will swallow his pride and start over by re-opening the restaurant together with his brother and with the help of his children who are not very keen on changing address and lifestyle. Naturally there are a few jokes about ‘The Greek, Death and Taxes’; there is competition with a Turkish restaurant next door, romance and the dreadful seven-year-old young stock market genius Theo – the youngest of the three children.

The basic idea could have led to something endearing and entertaining, but poor script and direction (by Marcus Markou) only resulted in 109 very long minutes without either. In spite of this, Stephen Dillane as Harry manages to bring something believable to the story, and the plates of fish & chips are mouthwatering. (Carola A)