Until 1957, when antibiotics were introduced to treat Hansen’s Disease (named after the researcher who identified the bacteria that caused leprosy), Greeks suffering from the disease were sent to the infamous lepers’ colony of Spinalonga, a tiny island with a 16th-century Venetian fortress off the coast of Elounda on the island of Crete. Today, it is a tourist attraction.
The name of the 19th-century Danish researcher who discovered the bacterium that causes the disease was attached to it a century later to lessen the huge social stigma attached to the word ‘leper’.
Today a tourist attraction, the tiny islet of Spinalonga, off the coast of Elounda on north-eastern Crete, served as a leper colony in the early 20th century.
It was after patients were transferred to the Agia Varvara Infectious Diseases Hospital in the Athens suburb of Egaleo that Swiss dentist Julien Grivel, prompted by his friend Maurice Born, a Swiss architect, sociologist and writer who had studied the sociology of Spinalonga, accepted a proposal that he work on the teeth of a Hansen’s patient at the hospital.
That launched a medical Odyssey that lasted 26 years, with Grivel returning annually in his vacation time to his own private Ithaca (as he calls Greece) to treat Hansen’s patients for free until medicines eradicated the disease.
That is where the multiple award-winning Greek documentary filmmaker Stavros Psyllakis—himself a Cretan—comes in with a superb new documentary entitled Sculpted Souls. The title refers to both the souls of the Hansen’s Disease patients, sculpted by suffering, discrimination and accrued wisdom, and Grivel’s own soul, which was shaped by his interaction with them and the unspoken spiritual gifts he acquired through selfless service.
Director Stavros Psyllakis (left) and Julien Grivel (right) chat at a cafe in Athens.
Unlike traditional Philhellenes, who were enamored of Greece’s ancient culture, Julien fell in love with the modern Greeks, gaining a great proficiency in the language, which granted him access to the culture and soul of a people whom he came to love dearly.
Psyllakis put TO BHMA International edition in contact with Grivel, so we could ask him the crucial question:
What made you do it?
When a friend proposed I go to Athens to treat the teeth of a Hansen’s patient, a voice inside my head said “Get up and go, it’s worth it!” So I laid caution aside, took the risk, and went to Saint Barbara’s Infectious Diseases Hospital.
Thankfully, the patients there gave me the psychological strength I needed through their endurance, their dignity, their wisdom and their courage. It was from them that I learned the meaning of life. They all enjoy a very special place in my heart.
I am part of a generation that learned to respect the “other” without religious sentiment or reference to any particular aspect of Swiss culture. When I took my decision, I listened to my heart, to my instinct.
Fairly early on, the words of the Greek poet and Nobel Laureate George Seferis made an enormous impression on me:
“In our gradually shrinking world, everyone is in need of all the others. We must look for man wherever we can find him.”
I am also attached to a maxim expressed by Edgard Morin: “We must transform the human species into genuine humanity.”
Psyllakis on the making of Sculpted Souls: documentary viewed as fiction
What is a documentary?
That’s a great question, because it is decisive. After I discovered the documentary form, I came to love it. Until I dedicated myself exclusively to it, to the point where I no longer have any interest in making fiction films. Not at all—absolutely none. One other reason I’m not interested in feature films is that I consider the documentary to be a form of fiction, albeit one created under completely different terms from what we know about movies and the fictions we have heard of.
So, it is fiction—100%. And it gives me the opportunity to get creative, especially in the editing phase, when the final product is created. And I wouldn’t trade that for anything. When I first discovered—or rather encountered—documentaries, in France in 1988, I felt the form was a perfect fit for me. It was like finding a tailor-made suit that fit just right. I felt very comfortable with it, because I enjoy interacting with people, loved the element of exchange and forging the relationship dynamic.
Athens coffee shop with owner Elias (left), and Grivel’s wife Christiane seated beside her husband.
How did you first meet Julien Grivel?
I met him when Marina Fountoulaki, the niece of old Manolis Fountoulakis—a Hansen’s patient who plays a central role in the narrative of Sculpted Souls through an amazing older interview shot by Jean-Daniel Pollet, but previously unaired—gave me a copy of Julien’s book: Greece, My Ithaca.
I attended an event in his honor staged in 2023 by the Municipality of Agia Varvara, where he had worked. After all the glowing tributes to Julien from doctors to journalists, he stood up to thank them.
And that’s when the man won me over—with his incredible humility, his modest words, his great kindness. A kindness so rare, it piqued my interest.
How was Julien’s soul “sculpted” by his experience of the suffering, social exclusion and accrued wisdom that left their mark on the souls of his Hansen’s patients?
I think this is what emerges from the film, without any grandiloquent language. This is what we see, and it comes across strongly. Look, he comes into contact with the modern Greeks. We usually have a certain image of European Philhellenes, which is defined by an adoration of antiquity. That’s what they love and learn most about. But Julien learned to love modern Greece, the people of today, and managed to discover the wealth these everyday people carry within through their hardships.
The people he describes in the book and who feature in the film are simple folk. To understand and feel them better, he took on the challenge of learning Greek extremely well, and that involves taking on board the Greek mindset, too: how Greeks think today.
He discusses some of the people who made a deep impression on him, people like ‘Saint Ekaterini’, as he calls her. She was a woman whose husband fell ill with leprosy, and then her two children, two or three years later.
Why do you think Julien was given permission to undertake this mission?
One reason why the health minister at the time, Spyros Doxiadis, gladly gave permission—aside from Julien’s personality—was that these patients hid from everyone. They didn’t want anyone to know they were sick, that they had leprosy. A Greek doctor told me that this was because people knew that so-and-so from such-and-such village had leprosy. But Julien was an outsider: he knew nothing and no one. As Manolis Fountoulakis underlines, his three sisters never married because of the stigma; it was a huge problem.
Front row (L to R) Director Jean-Daniel Pollet (who made a 1972 film on lepers) the already highly disfigured patient Epameinondas Remountakis, and Maurice Born (who persuaded Julien to treat his first Hansen’s patient). Back row: A friend of Pollet and Remountakis’ wife Tasia.
What was the biggest lesson you learned from making the film, and what would you like the public to take away from it?
What I want the public to take away are the humility, simplicity and compassion this story teaches. Julien’s story is a testament to human kindness beyond borders and prejudices, and to the resilience of people forgotten by society. It’s about dignity amidst hardship and the power of human connection.
When you get to know a person with a rich soul, when you truly connect with a spirit like that, it’s something rare and precious. As you grow older, you realize that there are few truly valuable things in life. I consider my relationship with Julien—a friendship built on mutual respect and affection—truly precious. I so look forward to escaping from the world for a couple of days, just to sit down with him and talk.
Julien gazes at the grave of Lenio and Manolis Fountoulakis. When he was diagnosed, Manolis wrote to her to forget him and start a new life. ‘That’s out of the question. We shall climb up this Golgotha together,’ she replied. When she died decades later, his daughter kept him from commiting suicide.
