LTFF blog website

British Council’den sinema girişimcilerine destek

LTFF — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 22:14:22 +0000

British Council, Sinema – Televizyon alanında çalışan yaratıcı girişimcileri destekleyip, film, televizyon ve animasyon alanında çalışmalarının önemini vurgulamak amacıyla Yılın Genç Sinema – Televizyon Girişimcisi Yarışması’nı bu sene ilk kez Türkiye’de de düzenliyor.

Yılın Genç Sinema – Televizyon Girişimcisi Yarışması programı, dünya çapında, özellikle de gelişmekte olan ülkelerin sinema – televizyon sektöründe gerçekleştirdikleri başarılı çalışmaları ve ortaklıkları desteklemeyi ve bu alanlarda daha fazla genç girişimcilerin yer almasını teşvik etmeyi amaçlıyor. Söz konusu yarışmayla hedeflenen, İngiltere’yle olan kültürel, yaratıcı ve ticari bağları kullanarak, sinema – televizyon alanına uluslararası iş dünyasındaki yenilikçi fikirleri taşıyabilmek. Jürisinde sinema yazarı Burcu Aykar Şirin, Ermenistan Türkiye Sinema Platformu Koordinatörü Çiğdem Mater, Antrakt Sinema Gazetesi Genel Yayın Yönetmeni Deniz Yavuz, Yönetmen Hüseyin Karabey ve Yapımcı Nadir Öperli isimlerinin yer alacağı yarışma, uzun metraj film, kısa film, belgesel, televizyon yapımları ve animasyon alanlarında faaliyet gösteren veya belirtilen bu alanlarda festival veya tanıtım organizasyonu düzenleyen bütün genç girişimcilere açık.

Yarışmayı kazanan kişi Türkiye’de Yılın Genç Sinema – Televizyon Girişimcisi unvanını kazanıp 11 – 21 Ekim tarihleri arasında, 12 ülkeden gelecek olan finalistlerin katılımıyla, İngiltere’de 20 Ekim’de düzenlenecek uluslararası yarışmada Türkiye’yi temsil edecek. Tüm masrafları British Council tarafından karşılanacak bu program kapsamında Türkiye finalisti İngiltere’nin önde gelen uluslararası üne sahip sinema – televizyon sektörü çalışanlarıyla görüşüp, tanışma fırsatı bulacak.

“Sinema – Televizyon” terimi uzun metraj film, kısa film, belgesel, televizyon yapımları ve animasyonu içeriyor. Yarışmaya başvuracak kişilerin çalışmalarını, bu yapımlarla ilgili olarak dağıtım, satış, sergi, sinema salonu, festival, aktivite, gazete, yayıncılık, pazarlama, halkla ilişkiler, tanıtım, eğitim, satış, sanatçı yönetimi alanlarının birinde faaliyet yürütmesi gerekmekte.

Yarışmaya katılabilmek için gerekli şartlar ise, 25–35 yaşları arasında olmak, kendini iyi derecede sözlü ve yazılı ifade edebilecek İngilizce bilgisine sahip olmak, belirlenen alanlardan birinde çalışmak ve Sektörde Türkiye’de geleceğin liderlerinden olma potansiyeline sahip olmak. Yarışmaya son katılım tarihi 16 Eylül 2010, başvurular British Council sitesinden yapılacak.

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Second time around one time too many for moviegoers

LTFF — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 11:25:06 +0000

The period billed as the “dead season,” which runs from spring till autumn, is probably the biggest problem faced by the Turkish movie industry — a sector that has waged an uphill battle in the past decade with the number of films being released per year increasing by the dozens.

23 July 2010, Friday ALİ KOCA İSTANBUL

Black Dogs Barking

However, while Hollywood usually waits for the summer season to release some of its anticipated big-budget blockbusters, the struggling Turkish movie industry is practicing exactly the opposite of what Hollywood is doing.

On the surface, the reason for this is box-office figures; movie distributors say there are fewer moviegoers during the summer months in Turkey and that they do not want to risk their investments. So a number of Turkish films that have already completed their theatrical runs during the “high season” are getting second runs during summer. The most recent example for this practice was “Nefes: Vatan Sağolsun” (Breath), director Levent Semercioğlu’s debut feature that follows a group of 40 soldiers in charge of protecting a relay station in southeastern Turkey near the Iraqi border, which hit theaters again last Friday. The film originally opened in Turkey on Oct. 16, 2009 for a 28-week run, during which it reached around 2.5 million moviegoers. Box-office figures for the film’s second run are not yet available, so it is too early to judge whether the practice will prove fruitful or not for this film in particular.

But “Nefes” is not the only film to be re-released recently in Turkey. So we decided maybe it was time we questioned why a movie, months after its first run — and in some cases after its DVD is already out — is re-released in theaters. And the re-release we’re referring to here is not as part of a batch screening of old films held in historic movie theaters in Beyoğlu, but rather a second run made available by a film’s own producers and distributors.

“Kara Köpekler Havlarken” (Black Dogs Barking), husband-and-wife co-directors Mehmet Bahadır Er and Maryna Gorbach’s joint directorial debut, took its second turn two weeks ago, while “Romantik Komedi” (Romantic Comedy), whose title is an obvious hint at its genre, reopened on June 25. No box office figures have been released about “Kara Köpekler” because the film’s producer did not want this information to be made public. “Romantik Komedi,” on the other hand, could not even attract 10,000 moviegoers in its second run, which came about four months after its original release, during which it sold around 700,000 tickets. Pinema Film, the Turkish distributor company behind both films, says “audience demand” was an effective factor in the re-release of both titles, but ticket sales do not seem to prove that.

The Girl with the Red Scarf by Atif Yilmaz in 1978

Excepting “Selvi Boylum Al Yazmalım” (The Girl with the Red Scarf), whose restored version reopened on May 14, some 32 years after its original theatrical release, there are plenty of movies seeking new life in theaters during the usually stale summer season. Although the chief aim seems to be to reinvigorate movie theaters during the summer season, this is not the sole purpose.

Another chance after award win
Director Tolga Örnek’s “Devrim Arabaları” (Cars of the Revolution), which hit theaters on Oct. 24, 2008 in what was billed as “an unlucky time” due to a plethora of Turkish movies opening on or around the same weekend, only managed to draw around 150,000 — half the number of moviegoers Örnek estimated — in its first run. But after Örnek’s period drama started to garner nominations and award wins in Turkey and abroad, it had a second run starting May 1, 2009, during which it sold around 38,000 more tickets.

Re-releasing a movie following a major award win is not uncommon in Hollywood. “The Hurt Locker,” which brought its director Kathryn Bigelow the best director Oscar in this year’s Academy Awards, drew just 5,000 moviegoers to Turkish theaters when it first opened here on Oct. 2, 2009, whereas it sold 15,554 tickets during its second run following the film’s Oscar glory.

‘Due to immense demand’
Another problem faced by Turkish productions in the box office is the crammed schedule in the “high season” that runs between the months of September and May, when two or three Turkish productions are released each week. “Devrim Arabaları” encountered just that situation when it opened two years ago. Thus, the demand from moviegoers who miss a certain film due to too many titles opening in the same week is part of the factors that shape a distributor’s decision to give a film a second run.

However, even when the audience asks for a second showing, box office figures do not always prove their zest for the title. Director Mahsun Kırmızıgül’s “Güneşi Gördüm” (I Saw the Sun) sold around 2.5 million tickets — well above experts’ expectations — in its 11-week run starting in March 2009. But when “Güneşi Gördüm” reopened around six months after its initial run, it couldn’t even find 2,000 viewers.

Previously on the ‘Twilight Saga’…
Probably the most interesting reason for second runs is to remind the viewer of the previous installments of a popular franchise, with the most recent example being the “Twilight Saga.” Before the June 30 opening of the series’ third film, “Eclipse,” the first and second films in the franchise were re-released in theaters. “New Moon,” the series’ second film, which exceeded 1.2 million viewers during its original run that started in November 2009, only managed to draw about 15,000 viewers in its recent re-release. “Twilight,” the series’ opening film, did not even reach that level and sold only 290 tickets in its second run in just four theaters.

It seems Turkish moviegoers, even though they ask for an encore, are reluctant to go see a film after it completes its first run, maybe because of “summer sluggishness.”

For the producers and distributors, it seems re-releases are at least “better than nothing,” since they don’t pose any disadvantages — as long as they don’t require any additional costs, which is usually the case, because the copies of the film have already been paid for.

Resource Today’s Zaman

Films document century of Turkish-Armenian conflict

LTFF — Sat, 10 Jul 2010 11:55:42 +0000

While efforts for dialogue between Armenian and Turkish civil society have increased in recent years, Turkish movie audiences still seem to struggle in controlling their anger on the Armenian topic – as evidenced by the hostility toward Armenian-Canadian director Atom Egoyan’s 2002 film ‘Ararat.’ Hollywood, however, treated the topic as early as 1919

Get ready for troubled history, as well as unresolved political, social and cultural turmoil between Turkey and Armenia to make further news this week as Armenian-Canadian director Atom Egoyan’s latest film, “Chloe,” is one this week’s new releases.

Egoyan’s name in Turkey is synonymous with 2002’s “Ararat,” his controversial take on the events of 1915 in eastern Anatolia. And even though “Chloe” is an erotic-thriller with no relation whatsoever to history, Egoyan’s name is nearly always mentioned with “Ararat” and his identity as an Armenian in the Turkish media.

On Monday, the Friends of Hrant Dink, a non-profit organization founded by friends and followers of the Turkish-Armenian newspaper editor Dink, who was murdered in a hate crime in 2007, will gather to watch the court hearing of the murder case. Although three years have passed since Dink was murdered, the investigation, so far, has been inconclusive.

“We are two sick nations, Turks and Armenians in our relations. Who is going to heal us? The remedy for Armenians is Turks, the remedy for Turks is Armenians. Our medicine is dialogue.” Hrant Dink

The troubled history between Turkish and Armenian communities goes back to 1915 when the Ottoman Empire forcibly deported the Armenians of eastern Anatolia. The global tensions have been the norm for decades with answers to certain questions raising unresolved debates around the world.

What really happened in eastern Anatolia in 1915? How are we to define what happened to the Armenians: forced resettlement, massacre or genocide? Why is the issue unresolved after 95 years? What was chronicled by those who experienced the events of the period? Can an “official opinion” on the issue be defined as the “Turkish thesis”? Why are Turks so sensitive about the issue?

Efforts at reconciliation and peace by Turkish-Armenian dialogue groups have increased in the recent years following the historic meeting between Presidents Abdullah Gül and Serge Sarkisian two years ago. Turkish and Armenian civil society groups, as well as artists, have been sending messages of peace for some time now. Istanbul-based groups Kardeş Türküler and the Sayad Nova Chorus have taken the stage in Yerevan. And recently, world-renowned Turkish-Armenian musician Arto Tunçboyacıyan, rock singer Yaşar Kurt, and the Armenian Navy Band sang for “Against Hatred and Animosity” in New York.

Eight decades before ‘Ararat’

While music seems to be the unifying force, cinema continues to be more problematic in dealing with the Armenian-Turkish conflict. “Ararat” might be the poster-film of the conflict as it was directed by an award-winning, Oscar-nominated director with global fame, but the earliest depiction of the 1915 events in cinema goes back to 1919.

The Hollywood production “Ravished Armenia” was based on the memoirs of an Armenian woman, Aurora Mardiganian, who had survived to tell her account of the events.

While there are no copies left except a restored 24-minute segment, an article in the New York Times describes that in the first half, Armenia is shown “ as it was before Turkish and German devastation, and led up to the deportation of priests and thousands of families into the desert.”

Adapted from a novel by Hrachya Kochar, the 1977 movie “Nahapet” by Armenian director Henrik Malyan tells the story of a man who tries to rebuild his life after losing his wife, his daughter, and his village in 1915. The film was screened in Cannes in 1978 and later broadcast in BBC to positive reviews.

Another film on a similar topic was directed in 1991 by French-Armenian director Henri Verneuil. “Mayrig” (Mother) starred Claudia Cardinale and Omar Sharif as members of an Armenian family that emigrated to France after 1915. The film was such a success that it was later turned into a TV series, and a sequel, “588 rue paradis,” was filmed.

Undoubtedly the most popular film about this dark part of modern history, however, is Egoyan’s “Ararat.”

Taking Mount Ararat as a symbol for the collective historical consciousness of the Armenians, Egoyan tries incorporating different points of view and collective psyche into his film through setting the plot as a film-within-a-film.

Charles Aznavour plays Canadian-Armenian director Edward Saroyan who is filming a film about the siege of Van, which kick-started the deportation decision for the Armenians.
During the filming of the fictional film in “Ararat,” Armenian and Turkish actors, as well as the director, are led to confront history they thought they knew. The film’s fragmented, confusing structure, according to Egoyan, “reflects the Armenian psyche.” An edited version of the film was broadcast on one Turkish TV channel, Kanal Türk, years after its release.

Egoyan’s name has been a source of hatred by many in Turkey who haven’t seen a single film by the acclaimed director, yet alone “Ararat.” That’s why his latest “Chloe” is mentioned without so much as a sentence about the film, but only serves to draw spite for a film he shot eight years ago.

It’s best to remember what Dink said in an interview: “We are two sick nations, Turks and Armenians in our relations. Who is going to heal us? The remedy for Armenians is Turks, the remedy for Turks is Armenians. Our medicine is dialogue.”

EMRAH GÜLER ISTANBUL – Hürriyet Daily News

Links:

Ravished Armenia Wikipedia

Nahapet Wikipedia

Mayrig Wikipedia

An interview with Atom Egoyan about Chloe in Slant Magazine

Mount Ararat History and Facts

Articles about Chloe in Turkish

BÜYÜK HATA (CHLOE) by CÜNEYT CEBENOYAN – Birgün

“Kanadalı yönetmen Atom Egoyan’ın Tapınma’dan sonraki çalışması Büyük Hata, San Sebastian Film Festivali’nin açılış filmiydi” - Hürriyet

Stewartlar… Ve Chloe ARZU DEDEOĞLU Milliyet

Atom Egoyan’dan heyecanlı bir uzun metraj… MSN Aktif Sinema

Yücel designing poster for Kırmızıgül’s ‘Five Minarets in New York’

LTFF — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 10:13:25 +0000

Well-known US-based Turkish graphic artist Emrah Yücel is designing the poster for “New York’ta Beş Minare” (Five Minarets in New York), singer-turned-filmmaker Mahsun Kırmızıgül’s third directorial effort.

Written and directed by Kırmızıgül and produced by Boyut Film, “Five Minarets in New York” follows two police officers from the southeastern Turkish province of Diyarbakır, sent to New York to bring back a Turkish smuggler who was arrested in the United States and who will be delivered to Turkish authorities by the FBI.

Yücel, favored by film producers as a result of posters he designed for Hollywood hits such as “Kill Bill,” “I Robot,” “The Talented Mr. Ripley” and the “Star Wars” trilogy, reworked the movie’s original poster as an initial step, but his new design will be unveiled in September, around two months before the film’s Turkish theatrical release.

The reworked poster features New York’s signature skyline in the background with minarets rising among skyscrapers. Yücel also added headshots of the film’s leading cast, which includes veteran stage and screen actor Haluk Bilginer, pop singer-songwriter Mustafa Sandal, who is making his first foray into feature film acting, and Kırmızıgül, who is playing one of the Turkish cops.

Cast: Haluk Bilginer, Mahsun Kırmızıgül, Mustafa Sandal, Zafer Ergin, Engin Altan Düzyatan, Eşfer Kolçak, Hüseyin Avni Danyal, Salih Kalyon, Murat Ünalmış Dir: Mahsun Kirimizigul, Producer: Murat Tokat. Director of photography: Jim Gucciardo Production Company: Boyut Film.35mm, Anamorphic 1-2.35, color. Distribution company: Pinema Film Release Date: Fall 2010.

“Five Minarets in New York” will again feature a glittering cast, as was the case in Kırmızıgül’s two previous films. His debut, “Beyaz Melek” (The White Angel), brought together an ensemble cast of Turkey’s best known veteran thespians, including Yıldız Kenter, Erol Günaydın and Gazanfer Özcan; and his sophomore feature, “Güneşi Gördüm” (I Saw the Sun), featured yet another impressive lineup that included such names as Şerif Sezer, Altan Erkekli and Demet Evgar, as well as serving as a milestone in the career of young actor Cemal Toktaş.

In “Five Minarets in New York,” Kırmızıgül is being joined by US actors Danny Glover, Robert Patrick and Gina Gershon, a lineup that is likely to draw even more moviegoers to theaters than Kırmızıgül’s previous directing efforts.

Filming for “Five Minarets in New York,” one of the most anticipated films of the upcoming season, is currently under way in New York. Yücel, who met with Kırmızıgül this week on the film set in New York, told reporters that he believed the movie will be the most significant film in Kırmızıgül’s career, and added that it had the potential to “pave the way for even bigger success.”

“Hollywood’s big names agreeing to take part in Mahsun’s film is significant for both Turkey’s promotion abroad and for Turkish cinema’s potential of being marketed internationally,” Yücel added.

“Five Minarets in New York” will hit theaters on Nov. 5.

Resource: TODAY’S ZAMAN İSTANBUL

Links:

EMRAH YUCEL’s Official Website

Trailer

Yavuz Turgul completes filming of Hunting Season/Av Mevsimi

LTFF — Sun, 27 Jun 2010 09:22:51 +0000

Turgul was born in Istanbul, 1946. He worked as journalist for many years. In 1976 he started to write scripts with the support of Ertem Egilmez. His first directing experience came with the movie Fahriye Abla, in 1984. He worked with famous Turkish actor Sener Sen in so many movies. Turgul is one of the best directors in Turkey.

Film stills from “Av Mevsimi” (Hunting Season), one of the most eagerly anticipated Turkish movies of the upcoming season, have been released this week after director Yavuz Turgul wrapped filming of the movie.

Starring Şener Şen and Cem Yılmaz as two cops, the film also features veteran Çetin Tekindor in its glitzy cast. The film, which had a working title of “Av” (The Hunt), is planned for a December theatrical release.

resources: Today’s Zaman

Links

Yavuz Turguls Bio

(in Turkish) Eksi Sozluk

Istanbul memories on focus of six filmmakers

LTFF — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 06:54:06 +0000

‘Do not forget me – Istanbul’ is a joint effort by six directors mainly from the Balkans and the Middle East who want to remind people that Istanbul is a city whose memories go beyond Turkey’s borders and whose history belongs to the people of those countries as well. The filmmaker hopes the film will vie for prestigious awards at the Cannes and Berlin film festivals

An up-and-coming film aims to remind new generations of the cultural influence that Istanbul has left in the collective memories of many nations.

It is the metropolis where West meets East, the city that has witnessed the rise and fall of empires, and the place where countless people from Anatolia, the Balkans and the Middle East have written their life stories. And it will be the theme of “Do not forget me – Istanbul.”

The film is a joint effort of six talented directors mainly from the Balkans and the Middle East – Bosnian Aida Begic, Serbian Stefan Arsenijevic, Greek Stergios Niziris, U.S.’s Eric Nazarian, Palestinian Omar Shargawi and Hany Abu-Assad. They want to remind people that Istanbul is a city whose memories exceed Turkey’s borders and whose history belongs to the peoples of these countries as well.

Hüseyin Karabey, the artistic director for the film, told the Hürriyet Daily News & Economic Review that two years ago when he was participating in the Thessaloniki Film Festival he met well-known Greek screenplay writer Petros Markaris. They were talking about Istanbul, where Markaris was brought up, when Karabey discovered he was living in the same apartment Markaris used to, 40 years ago.

“Such a coincidence is unbelievable even in a film,” said Karabey, adding that it had been really moving to learn they had so much in common. “I immediately thought about my other friends and colleagues from the Balkans and the Middle East, whom stories about their old links with Istanbul I used to hear about frequently,” he said, adding that many people in the Balkans and Middle East have strong links with the city, although they might never have visited it in their lives.

Karabey said the directors would work in strong cooperation with young Turkish directors and actors and that their assistants will be young talented students. “It is not only a matter of just shooting the film,” he said, adding that the people involved would have the chance to gain a lot of experience and that through networking new projects may be developed in the future.

Karabey said he would best describe Istanbul with Makaris’ expression: “One can create a story about many cities, but Istanbul is a city that creates stories.”

Omar Shargawi, the director of the Golden Tiger-awarded “Go with peace Jamil” from Palestine, who was in Istanbul for a five-day workshop on the film with the other directors, told the Daily News he felt like it was the only time he had the chance to make a film and have fun at the same, adding that he experienced very romantic moments when he first came to the city.

Istanbul is one of the world’s monumental cities, according to Shargawi, who said the city was very special for him and his country of origin. “I do not feel I have any links with other big cities such as Rome, Paris or New York, but it is different with Istanbul,” he said, adding that there are two big cities with a big influence in the region: Istanbul and Cairo.

Shargawi, who was brought up in Denmark, said that in Europe, history had taught him that Turks were the enemy. “When I grew up, the picture turned around and I realized the opposite was true. After finishing his project in Istanbul, he plans to shoot a film in film in Cairo.

Bosnian director Aida Begic, well known for the Cannes Critics’ Week Grand Prize-awarded “Snow,” told the Daily News that making a film about Istanbul would be a big challenge for her as a director. “I find the concept marvelous and brave,” she said, adding that uniting well-known directors from different parts of world who have relations with the city was difficult but very successfully achieved by Karabey.

Begic said she felt both love and hate the first time she visited the city in 2003. “Istanbul is like a wild animal that is always running away from your arms,” she said, adding that although it was very chaotic, she fell in love with the city and that she was excited to express this still very passionate and wild love for Istanbul in the short film she will make. Begic also said Istanbul was literally between West and East, which makes it a great place where diversities meet. “We can explore ideas of universality and individuality in this city,” she said.

Stergios Niziris

Turkish filmmaking is like a diamond that is being revealed to the world, according to Begic. “The whole world is expecting Turkish cinema to explode,” she said, adding that it was experiencing an international opening that wanted to host international directors as well, of which she felt very honored.

As artistic director, Karabey said the cost for the film would reach 3 million Turkish Liras, of which 60 percent would be funded by the 2010 Istanbul European Capital of Culture agency and the rest by other foreign sponsors. Filming will start in July this year and the premiere is planned for the end of 2010.

“Do not forget me – Istanbul” will vie for prestigious awards at the Cannes Film Festival. Karabey said they talked to the festival organizers about the film and that even the fact of getting so many well-known directors together for this project seemed to be very exciting for them. He said they also intended to submit it to the Berlin Film Festival.

The stories

All of the short films will take place in Istanbul. Most of the actors will be Turkish, but the language of the main characters will be that of the country they represent. Here is the summary of some of the stories:

Amenak comes to Istanbul for the first time and feels like he has known the city for many years. As he searched for an old instrument shop among narrow streets in the city center, which his grandfather used to own a long time ago, he wonders what could have made his parents leave the city before he was born. The streets seem like extracts from his childhood memories, memories that have never existed … or have they?

Dragan and Ana take a long, tiring bus trip every weekend to sell cheap gadgets they carry in old suitcases in the urban jungle called Aksaray. One weekend they lose each other in the crowded streets, and while desperately looking for her husband, Ana encounters someone she lost many years ago: her son Marko who died in the war that tore the Balkans apart in the 1990s. Could that really be him?

Vangelis travels a lot between Istanbul and Thessaloniki for business, but feels like he is unwanted in Istanbul, which is why he prefers not to stay more than one day. Then one day his bag is stolen and he has to stay until he finds it. As he searches for the guy who hit him and ran away with his bag, he meets Zeynep and she helps him find his bag. But what else will he find in her?

Martha has come to Istanbul for the first time to meet her overseas boyfriend. She has to stay alone during the first day of her trip and gets anxious as she faces the city’s uncanny, poor neighborhoods. As her anxiety passes, she is hit by bad news: her boyfriend cannot come to Istanbul.

Resource: ERİSA DAUTAJ ŞENERDEM ISTANBUL – Hürriyet Daily News

Links:

Tanınmış 6 yönetmen ‘İstanbul hikayelerini’ filme çekiyor

Turkey’s new wave cinema tackles difficult topics

LTFF — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 08:33:02 +0000

When Turkish director Semih Kaplanoğlu’s film Honey won the Golden Bear award in the 2010 Berlin Film Festival this February, international film critics turned their attention to Turkish cinema.

Honey is the final part of Kaplanoğlu’s trilogy, which narrates three stages of the life of a man in reverse chronological order. Alluding to religious myths and rituals, the three films address universal issues concerning human existence, such as the meaning of life and death, the loss of a loved one and faith and destiny.

One of the prominent directors of new wave cinema in Turkey, Kaplanoğlu indicated in the press conference after the award ceremony that his trilogy seeks to explore the spiritual side of life, something that is often left unaddressed in Turkey’s secular society.

Films coming out of Turkey in recent years are touching a greater number of people around the world than ever before – as a result of screenings held at festivals and universities, and by civil society organisations. These films are shedding light, both in Turkey and beyond, on the lives of ordinary people during Turkey’s recent turbulent political climate.

After a two-decade recession in the film sector, the mid-1990s witnessed the emergence of a new wave of Turkish cinema – one that represents a clear break with previous modes of filmmaking in Turkey. New wave cinema is comprised of two sub-genres: new popular cinema, dominated mostly by comedies with considerable box office success, and art-house cinema whose films are receiving critical acclaim and prestigious awards in national and international festivals.

Independent art-house cinema has proven immensely popular among international audiences and films of this variety have been prominently featured in competitions and film festivals in Europe. It features two types of films: personal films exploring the human soul – like Kaplanoğlu’s Honey – and political films which address issues not extensively explored in Turkish cinema before: the periods of martial law (following the military coups of 27 May 1960, 12 March 1971; and 12 September 1980); past discriminatory policies against religious and ethnic minorities, such as people of Greek or Armenian origin; and the conflict with Kurdish separatist guerillas in the southeast.

Such films are helping to generate public discussion around certain taboo issues.

This new genre of film also has a significant impact on society, contributing to the cultivation of a new collective memory through which Turkish society can begin to face the painful and previously silenced episodes in its past.

For example, one film, Autumn, deals with the state-inflicted violence in Turkish prisons, showing segments of raw footage in its opening sequence taken during a bloody police intervention in response to the hunger strike of political prisoners in 2000 when 30 prisoners were killed. Young filmmaker Özcan Alper’s 2008 directorial debut, it is one of the most critically acclaimed political films of recent years.

The film gives an eloquent account of the homecoming journey of a left-wing political prisoner who was jailed when he was a university student and recently released from Turkish prison due to a fatal illness (caused by torture that he was subjected to in the prison) to return to his village in the eastern Black Sea region.

Autumn is one film out of the recent many that demonstrate Turkish cinema’s new preoccupation with the possibility for people in Turkey to come to terms with the political and social realities they have faced over the past few decades. Without offering clear-cut solutions, they are simultaneously informing those outside of Turkey of the complicated intricacies of Turkish society, and helping Turkish citizens come to terms with these tumultuous times.

Resource: *Asuman Suner Two Circles Net

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*Asuman Suner (asuner@itu.edu.tr) is Associate Professor at the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences at Istanbul Technical University and author of the new book New Turkish Cinema: Belonging, Identity and Memory ( I.B.Tauris Press). This article was written for the Common Ground News Service (CGNews).

Links:

Asuman Suner New Turkish Cinema

Coups In Turkey, 1960, 1970, 1980, 1997

Secularism in Turkey

Demographics of Turkey

Shades of grey in 1963 film

LTFF — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 10:20:22 +0000

TURKISH Cypriot director Dervish Zaim’s new film-in-the-making, Shadows and Shapes, is set to be his most controversial yet.

Set in 1963, the year in which the Cyprus Republic dissolved into ethnic violence, it follows the growing pains of Rusa, an adolescent girl from the Karpasia village of Komi Kebir.

But Istanbul-based Zaim says that ethnic conflict is only one of the film’s themes.
“It’s mainly a story about growing up,” Zaim told the Sunday Mail. “The conflict is in the background; it’s not the main theme”.

Nevertheless, the film’s promoters describe it as “a story that takes place as the events of 1963 unfold”, with Rusa and her shadow puppeteer father Veli separated as they flee their burning village. “The pain, the friendships, and the surrounding war casts a light on Cyprus’ story,” the promoters say.

Zaim says he set the film in 1963 “because in the almost 50 years that have passed since then, no one has made a film about that era”. “Those times are like a forgotten memory,” he says.

In his own community, however, the “Bloody Christmas of 1963” and its aftermath is anything but a forgotten memory. But as Zaim says, the film is not only, or even primarily about that.

“I believe it holds a universal message,” Zaim says. “It’s a message of peace, of growing together, of tolerance. In this sense it is not just a film about Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots.”

Naturally, Zaim cannot avoid the fact that he is making a film about a period of time that is remembered very differently by his community and Greek Cypriots. Nevertheless he insists that “as much as possible” he has “tried to stay faithful to historical events”.

Perhaps as a way of clarifying that he is not out to make a film about bad Greeks and oppressed Turks, the cast includes both Greek and Turkish Cypriot actors. Popi Avraam, among several other Greek Cypriot actors, plays a leading role as one of Rusa’s neighbours.

Zaim also insists he “tried to be as objective as possible” about what took place during the period covered by the film. “There are no blacks or whites. People are always grey. No one is purely good or bad,” Zaim says, adding that the characters in the film were “both fictitious and created from people I have met or heard about”.

Zaim adds Shadows and Shapes to a growing list of acclaimed low-budget films that includes Somersault in a Coffin, Waiting for Paradise, Dot and Mud. Zaim also worked with Panikos Chrysanthou in the making of the controversial but widely acclaimed Akamas, a film that, because of the sensitivity that surrounds it, still has not been shown on Cypriot TV either side of the Green Line. Zaim says he hopes to see Shadow and Shapes, which will be in Greek and Turkish, in cinemas next year.

Resource: Simon Bahceli Cyprus-Mail

Pirselimoğlu’s ‘Pus’ a hazy picture of İstanbul’s outskirts

LTFF — Sat, 29 May 2010 16:49:03 +0000

Film director-screenwriter Tayfun Pir-selimoğlu’s “Pus” (Haze) is just so desperately glamorous in its depression and misery that despite my inclination to dismiss it as a piece of narrative lethargy with its calculatedly slow-paced 109 minutes, the film is a cinematic landmark in illustrating a kind of suffocating inertia brought partly by poverty and alienation.

Reşat (Ruhi Sarı) is a young man living in the outskirts of the city with his aging sick mother. The neighborhood they inhabit, where the entire film takes place, is literally an urban disaster. The atmosphere is very important here, as Pirselimoğlu and his crew transform location scouting into an art by the places they have chosen. You sometimes wonder how such ugliness can be shot so beautifully (cinematographer Erkan Özcan must be acknowledged). The apartments, the office buildings, the decrepit courtyards, the dark concrete spaces under viaducts, the bad roads… everything here steams off a feeling of desperation and darkness. Plus, it being the middle of a grey winter doesn’t help lift anyone’s spirits — neither the characters nor the viewers.

This is a tale of interior drama, reflected astutely by its exteriors. And it is by no means to be dismissed despite a certain difficulty in understanding the personal motives of its almost mute lead. Reşat is an incredibly expressionless man; his days with his mother at home rely on routine and a certain fed-upness shown only through uncomfortable silences. He works at a bootleg DVD print store planted in a squalid concrete office building that reminds one of a parking lot. He doesn’t talk much with his macho colleagues, either, many of them rather shady. Of course, they’re not aware of how the seemingly harmless Reşat will eventually find his own shady side.

Haze “PUS”

Turkey/Greece

A Zuzi Film (Turkey)/Graal (Greece) production. (International sales: Graal, Athens.) Produced by Veysel Ipek, Katerina Ikonomou, Irini Vouyouklaki, Tayfun Pirselimoglu. Executive producers, Ilknur Akanlar, Nikos Moustakas. Directed, written by Tayfun Pirselimoglu.

With: Ruhi Sari, Mehmet Avci, Nurcan Ulger, Bahar Yanilmaz, Birol Engler, Serkan Keski (Variety)

Camera (color, HD-to-35mm), Ercan Ozkan; editor, Erdinc Ozyurt; art director, Natali Yeres. Reviewed at Berlin Film Festival (Forum), Feb. 17, 2010. Original title: Pus. Turkish dialogue. Running time: 108 MIN.

“Pus” is, in the end, Reşat’s story. Though it is all comprehensible that the general atmosphere of destitution that looms upon his life and his monosyllabic attitude is a vessel for his rebellious resentment, the film never allows the viewer to fully understand who Reşat really is or why he gets into muddy waters. He remains a mystery throughout the film while Pirselimoğlu and Sarı present a character whose face does not give into any decipherable expression. Reşat does not even blink, does not frown, does not twitch, does not smile. Even when he tries to communicate with the neighbor’s daughter whom he has a crush on, he is just vapid. He is never there.

Is he just a shadow of a human being, or is he just a complete nutcase? This extreme deadpan style can sometimes push the viewer away from the story. Of course, we cannot empathize with every screen character, but at least there should have been something about Reşat that could have further lured the audience into fully engaging in this drama.

Though the obscurity with the inner drama is maintained throughout, “Pus” remains a beautifully filmed picture that brings a realistic depiction of people that have been shunned from the city and left to “rot” inside and outside in the suburbs.

Pirselimoğlu’s unapologetically cutthroat and merciless vision of lower-income lethargy might frustrate the nerves of a softer audience, but it still remains truthful in showing a side of the city that exists and should not be avoided: impoverished, wretched and not so happy.

Resource: Today’s Zaman: EMİNE YILDIRIM İSTANBUL 29 May 2010, Saturday

Links:

Tayfun Pirselimoglu’s IMDB

Haze: Review by Derek ELLEY Variety

Bir Pirselimoğlu Evreni Sevin Okyay

ACIMASIZ VE TEKİNSİZ HAYATLAR Cuneyt Cebenoyan

Two films show rise of immigrant Turks in cinema

LTFF — Sat, 22 May 2010 08:59:49 +0000

Turkish immigrants in Europe take center stage in two films from non-Turkish directors currently playing in theaters. Here’s a look at how the depictions of the lives of Turks people in Europe have changed in cinema over the last three decades

What do two movies, one directed by an Austrian and the other by a Dutchman, playing in theaters right now have in common?

Both “Die Fremde” (When We Leave) and “Takiye: Allah’ın Yolunda” (In the Name of God) feature Turkish characters in their leads. Both films tell the stories of Turkish immigrants living in Europe and of characters who feel stuck between two cultures, two countries and between tradition and modernity.

“Die Fremde” stars Sibel Kekilli, the poster girl for Turkish immigrants in cinema, in an award-winning performance.

Director Feo Aladağ’s debut feature tells the story of Umay, a Turkish woman whose family lives in Germany. The film begins as she ends her marriage, running away from her thuggish husband with her son back to her family in Berlin. She finds out that it doesn’t really matter whether she’s in Turkey or Germany – as long as she’s a single mother, traditions work the same for a Turkish woman, even if she’s right in the middle of a culture with gender equality.

Director Ben Verlong’s “Takiye: Allah’ın Yolunda” is a genre-bending movie, a thriller that looks deep into the problems faced by Muslims in Europe in the last decade.

The joint Dutch-Turkish production delves into a recurring problem for Turkish people living in Europe: the investment scams that put people’s life savings into jeopardy, and the disappearance of investors with the huge sums of cash.

The film stars Erhan Emre as a man who entrusts his money to an Islamic investment, convincing those around him to do the same. In the end, of course, he is left empty-handed after the company goes bankrupt with the executives nowhere in sight.

From cardboard to realistic characters

The arrival of Turkish immigrants into Germany half a century ago (and later other Western European countries) marked the beginning of a cultural clash that has continued for decades.

Refusing to integrate into the cultures they had now become parts of, Turkish immigrants have generated scorn in the host countries over the years. When German immigrant cinema emerged in the 1970s and later blossomed in 1980s, harsh working conditions became a major theme. The characters, however, were largely cardboard and stereotyping became the norm as far as the development of Turkish roles.

Director Tevfik Başer’s “40 Metrekare Almanya” (40 Square Meters of Germany) of 1986 was a first in Turkish cinema when he provided a very realistic glimpse into the lives of Turkish immigrants in Germany.

The film put a female character in its center, the newly-wed Turna (Özay Fecht), who is taken from her village in Turkey to Germany to be locked in a small apartment everyday while her husband goes to work. The film was actually a harbinger of the things to come in the late 1990s and early 2000s.

Turkish and German filmmaker Fatih Akın has been a revered name among European cinephiles since the late 1990s with hits like “Im Juli” (In July) and “Solino.”

His Golden Bear-winning “Gegen die Wand” (Head-On), however, would become the benchmark for the depiction of Turkish people living in Germany. Akın not only became the voice of third-generation Turks in Germany with his modern classics like “Gegen die Wand” and “Auf der anderen Seite” (The Edge of Heaven), but he single-handedly maneuvered German cinema to include young Turkish directors and freed Turkish characters from being given stereotypical roles.

“Gegen die Wand” was a heartbreaking love story of two people living in cultural purgatory, between tradition and modernity, Turkey and Germany, survival and death.

Drawing from his long past as a migrant in Germany, Akın recreated the world of three generations of Turkish migrants in Germany. His genre-defining cinema gave these misfits a voice and an existence in pop culture, which at the end of the decade would open the way for young Turkish directors like Özgür Yıldırım to have their distinct voices in cinema.

Clash of civilizations on film

Young director Özgür Yıldırım’s “Chiko” of 2008 told the story of the street-smart Turkish boy İsa, known to many as Chiko, and his bumpy ride in the underground world of drugs. The film featured the self-made macho world of young Turkish boys in Germany, boys who become men with violence, drugs, and gang life. Stuck in a world of antiquated traditions and the burden of modern life, the macho underground life was shown to be these third-generation young Turks’ only ticket to self-respect.

Newcomer İnan Temelkuran’s debut feature “Made in Europe” took a glimpse into the cultural clash between Turks and Europe more broadly. Taking place in a single night, in three different metropolises in Europe, Madrid, Paris and Berlin, the film was more like three short films or a feature with three parts.

“Made in Europe” portrayed a group of characters (mostly men) in each city, talking as they do with one another, focusing on the sad stories of these men through sharp, realistic and surprisingly shocking dialogue. The film brought a totally fresh perspective to the lives of Turkish immigrants in Europe. Not only for the Turkish audience, the movie was a strong critique of all those celebrating cultural diversity in a Europe under the shadow of the supposed clash of civilizations.

Other directors who have forged into the slippery territory of Turks and Germans are Thomas Arslan, whose “Der schöne Tag” (A Fine Day) told the story of the struggle of a young Turkish woman (Serpil Turhan) to become an actress; Adnan Köse, who skillfully puts German and Turkish people next to one another in his films; and Buket Alakuş, whose most famous picture, “Anam” (My Mother), featured a hapless Turkish housewife and mother in Germany.

Resources: EMRAH GÜLER Hurriyet Daily NewsFriday, May 21, 2010