by Lina Damaskopoulou & Alexis Tsafas
No one knows where Mr. Efti comes from... Everyone knows where they want to be.
Set against the feverish nights of interwar Berlin, Giovanni Efthymiadis rises from migrant obscurity to become the legendary Mr. Efti, creator of the iconic Moka Efti, a palace of coffee, jazz, dance, and illusion.
The film unfolds non-chronologically, moving between the club’s glittering peak, its erasure under Nazism, and the forgotten solitude of its founder after the war. Through archival footage, photographs, press fragments, and a reflective voice-over, Moka Efti emerges not merely as a nightclub, but as a social machine: a space where class boundaries blur, identities are reinvented, and pleasure temporarily masks political collapse.
As the owner of one of Berlin’s most influential meeting places, Efthymiadis develops close relationships with industrialists, bankers, publishers, politicians, and state officials. The film traces these connections, seeking to uncover how nightlife, power, and political decision-making intersect and to examine the extent of Mr. Efti’s influence behind the scenes.
Efthymiadis builds a dream of effortless ascent, symbolized by Berlin’s first electric escalator, inviting thousands to climb toward a promised paradise. As swing rhythms intensify, darkness gathers beyond the dance floor: economic despair, moral compromise, and the rise of authoritarian power.
More than a historical portrait, the film is a meditation on illusion as a survival strategy. It asks how societies choose spectacle over truth and what remains when the music finally stops.
Mr. Efti: The King of Illusions reflects on a man, a city, and a moment when dancing felt like freedom, just before freedom disappeared.
