Atlanta's longest-running celebration of Greek and Cypriot cinema is back this week, with the Atlanta Greek Film Expo running Thursday through Sunday and inviting moviegoers to do more than just watch — they get to vote. The four-day event marks the festival's 11th year and brings six feature films and a selection of short films to local audiences, with ticketholders casting ballots for Best Feature Film and Best Short Film.
Audiences can vote for the festival's Best Feature Film and Best Short Film awards. The festival's own website describes this year's edition in similarly grand terms, calling the event, in its own words, “a blockbuster event that has become an annual tradition,” according to atlantagreekfilm.org. That site also confirms the festival runs October 15th through 18th.
The expo is organized entirely by volunteers as a project of the Atlanta chapter of Lykion ton Ellinidon, also known as the Lyceum of Greek Women, per the organization's website. Its stated mission is to elevate and promote Hellenic culture and arts in Atlanta while showcasing dynamic, innovative and highly acclaimed films from Greece and Cyprus.
Opening Night Brings a Director to Atlanta
This year's lineup includes titles such as Best Friends Forever, Hold Onto Me, Rooster, Last Call and Life in a Beat, per the festival's official schedule. Thursday, October 15, is Preview Night, featuring Best Friends Forever. The Official Opening Night is Friday, October 16, with a screening of the Cypriot film Hold Onto Me (Κράτα Με) and a special appearance by director Myrsini Aristidou, as reported by Southwest Gwinnett Magazine.
The magazine also reports that attendees are invited to vote for the 2026 Audience Awards for Best Feature Film and Best Short Film, echoing the voting element CBS News Atlanta highlighted in its coverage. An event listing from AllEvents places the expo at Primavera Cleaners, 2325 Cheshire Bridge Road NE in Atlanta, and notes that films will screen in Greek with English subtitles.
A Festival Rooted in Two Decades of Local Screenings
The expo's origins stretch back further than its official branding suggests. In 2006, the Atlanta chapter of Lykeion ton Ellinidon partnered with the Georgia Tech Hellenic Society for a screening of the Greek film A Touch of Spice at Garden Hills Theater, according to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. It wasn't until 2018, after years of partnering with other institutions for one-off screenings, that the Lyceum Club officially launched the Atlanta Greek Film Expo as its own standalone event, the newspaper reported.
Last year's expo, held Oct. 17-19 at Atlanta's Tara Theatre, was billed as celebrating a decade of bringing the best contemporary Greek and Cypriot films to the city, according to Creative Loafing Atlanta. That 2025 program featured five feature films, including the opening film Stelios, which was followed by a Q&A with star Asimenia Voulioti, plus the documentary Takis, the comedy Murphy's Law, and dramas Riviera and Meat, per Global Atlanta's event listing. Four short films rounded out last year's slate, along with the premiere of a music video by local artist George Skaroulis, Creative Loafing noted.
Coverage of the festival's scale has varied slightly from year to year. A 2024 listing from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution described five feature-length films and four shorts screening at Tara Theatre that October, a slightly different count than this year's six-feature, short-film lineup described by organizers for 2026.
