Morning Patrol (1987)

Interesting things are bound to happen whenever an independently minded maverick filmmaker tries their hand at science fiction as for all the successes there are also some pretty legendary horror stories. Chief among them being the Polish government shutting down the production of Andrzej Zulawski's On the Silver Globe (1977/88) and Richard Stanley's unceremonious firing from his dream project The Island of Dr. Moraeu (1996). There's also of course Alejandro Jodorowsky's failed attempts to adapt Dune into a film and David Lynch's subsequent 1984 film, which Lynch himself considers a failure due to his not having final cut. On the opposite end of the spectrum would be Paul Verhoeven, who found some of his greatest success in the sci-fi genre with RoboCop (1987), Total Recall (1990) and Starship Troopers (1997) and even Abel Ferrara who, despite numerous instances of studio interference, delivered a fantastic rendition of Body Snatchers (1993) and later a fascinating adaptation of William Gibson's cyberpunk story New Rose Hotel (1998). The sociopolitical allegories often found in the genre make it tailor-made for many of the aforementioned directors sensibilities, Verhoeven especially, so it made perfect sense for Greek outlaw Nikos Nikolaidis, who had been fighting against the system from the beginning, to step into the sci-fi realm and when the time came he had the perfect material with Morning Patrol, the second film in Nikolaidis' “Shape of the Coming Nightmare” trilogy.

In an unspecified future, a nomadic drifter (Michele Valley) traverses what has become of Athens which is controlled by a totalitarian dictatorship, in hopes of reaching the sea as a means of escape. Traveling at night in an attempt to avoid being caught and shot by the Morning Patrol, the government's police force ordered to shoot any and all persons out in the forbidden zones, the woman finds food and temporary shelter by breaking into abandoned houses. After one such stop however she encounters a Morning Patrol guard and quickly realizes he's as desperate to escape as she. Despite the dangers including other Morning Patrol officers aware of the guards treason and a mysterious illness affecting the guard, the two make a pact to travel west and attempt to reach the sea with the threat of death following their every move.

In Nikolaidis' fist feature Euridice BA 2037 (1975) which was also the first film in the “Shape of the Coming Nightmare” trilogy, Nikolaidis kept the majority of the film confined to the titular Euridice's apartment. With Morning Patrol (Proini Peripolos, πρωϊνή περίπολος), Nikolaidis extensively expands the palate, effectively turning all of Athens into a wasteland, offering a truly nightmarish vision of the future, or possibly the present. Just like in Euridice BA 2037, one of the more curious yet effective things regarding Morning Patrol is the sense of vagueness surrounding everything. It's never explained exactly what happened to make the world the way it is, be it war, disease, nuclear fallout, ect... It just is, which in effect makes the journey of the woman and the guard all the more harrowing, even with the mystery surrounding their characters as both remain enigmatic throughout. The films setting is also interesting. While its clear the film is supposed to be somewhat futuristic, Nikolaidis' aesthetic choices give the film a variety of flavors, at times post-apocalyptic given the sparseness of everything but there are times when the film also feels contemporary which again makes it seem as if Nikolaidis is saying the “future” depicted in the film had already arrived in 1987 and most interestingly, a touch of 1940's noir which fits surprisingly well. Nikolaidis also brilliantly avoids cliché when it comes to the developing relationship between the woman and guard, sidestepping any mawkish Hollywood-esque sentimentality in keeping with bleakness of the world the film presents.

The films biggest strength is unquestionably Michele Valley in her first role for Nikolaidis. A captivating presence who's impossible to look away from, the film wouldn't have been the same without her and the determination she brings to her nameless warrior. She would of course go onto to be one of Nikolaidis' most dependable performers, becoming completely unhinged in Nikolaidis' most infamous film Singapore Sling (1990) and she would appear in a very different type of role in the final “Shape of the Coming Nightmare” film, Nikolaidis final film The Zero Years (2005). Nikolaidis would rightfully proclaim the film to be ahead of its time and admitted being deeply affected by his own work, saying in an interview “Morning Patrol is a film that I still am afraid to watch. For many, its my best film, I'm just afraid of watching it. Because its a film speaking about all the things I was afraid that would come true and they finally all came true. Silence, ice, broken communication, lack of emotions, murder... I don't want to talk about this film. It disturbs me”. Being a Nikolaidis film, Morning Patrol is of course unique in the realm of sci-fi and given how certain things have played out around the globe since the film was made, it fits right in with the likes of On the Silver Globe and Hardware (1990). An essential Nikolaidis title.