Rembetiko is a Greek form of urban blues first performed in low-class clubs where the social "misfits" of the twenties, known as "rembetes," gathered. The music is simple (sometimes improvised), dolorous, altogether haunting; it's underground in spirit (telling of forbidden thoughts and topics) and sometimes in fact (as when it was banned during the Metaxa dictatorship). Rembetiko, the film by Costas Ferris, tells of the life of a famous rembetiko singer, Marika Ninou (portrayed by the exuberant Sotiria Leonardou who also co-wrote the script). Born into the Smyrna rembetiko tradition, reflecting the anguish of refugees from the Turkish scourge of 1922, Marika's life is as passionate as her songs. Through her music is filtered the story of modern Greece, from the twenties through the Nazi Occupation and the civil war that followed. Andrew Sarris writes, "I can heartily recommend this epic musical of the Greek underclass 'blues'.... Ferris' directorial style of slow, stately camera movements and very deliberate placements of the actors is similar to that of Angelopoulos. But the music and the heartfelt singing redeem the spectacle from self-conscious abstraction by serving as the dominant force in the lives of the characters."