Synagogue in prewar Kastoria; local Jewish families; street scenes
Footage from the Sam H. Elias Collection was featured in the 2016 documentary"Trezoro" directed by Larry Confino and Lawrence Russo. The film illustrates the Greek Sephardic community of Kastoria. Of the 1000 Jews who lived in Kastoria before the Holocaust, only 35 survived.
Façade of the synagogue in Kastoria (built in the 1800s and destroyed after WWII), inside there is a flag with the Star of David and a tablet with Hebrew writing/Ladino [plaque for Bocko Mayo with a poem that speaks to his qualities). A small child picks flowers off a bush. Isaac Elias, Sr. and his wife stand arm in arm and blow kisses to the camera. A young Maurice Russo at far right. Little girls wave at the camera. The outside storefront of Isaac Elias’s sewing machine shop (Isaac is the father of Jack Elias, the patriarch of the last remaining Jewish family in Kastoria today). Isaac stands in front of his shop. Isaac Elias Sr.’s wife looks down from her balcony [she perished during the Holocaust]. Man walks down the street towards the camera. A boy looks in the window of the sewing machine shop. Greek police/soldiers walk down the street. More people, including Isaac Elias Sr. on the balcony [the Elias family lives in this house today]. VAR shots of local Kastorians. Picking large bunches of flowers. Women on the balcony of a home. A Greek policeman and family. Another women on a balcony. A man stands in front of a house. A couple walks down the street. A group of men on the street. Elderly man with fez and cane. Landscape images of mountains and hillside from the perspective of a moving vehicle on a bumpy road. Street scenes, in Salonika or Athens, a woman walks down a set of stairs towards the camera.