Four Turkish titles at Rotterdam film festival

Four Turkish films, including Semih Kaplanoğlu's award-winning "Yumurta" (Egg) and Handan İpekçi's honor killing drama "Saklı Yüzler" (Hidden Faces), are featured in the Netherlands' International Rotterdam Film Festival, which marks its 37th edition Jan. 23-Feb. 3.

The 12-day festival, which kicked off Wednesday with the world premiere of Argentinean filmmaker Lucía Cedrón's debut feature "Cordero de Dios" (Lamb of God), will screen hundreds of independent productions from across the world.

Among Turkish titles lined up in the festival program is "Brain Surgeon," a short film by Ömer Ali Kazma, featured in the "Shorts: As Long as It Takes" section. The 15-minute film, part of the series "Obstructions," which centers on craftsmanship, details a brain surgery operation performed by Ali Zirh, a Turkish surgeon.

Another Turkish film in the lineup is "Gitmek" (My Marlon and Brando) by Hüseyin Karabey. The Turkish-Dutch-UK joint production, a dramatic road movie, is featured in the festival's "Time and Tide" category, in which "Egg" and "Hidden Faces" are also featured.

"My Marlon and Brando" is based on a true story about a young stage actress from İstanbul who wants to go to her lover. The only problem is that her lover is Kurdish, is in northern Iraq and the American invasion of Iraq makes communication even more difficult for the couple. The protagonists in the movie -- Ayça and Hama Ali -- are actors in their real lives, and in the movie they play themselves.

The Rotterdam Film Festival, under the direction of Rutger Wolfson, this year selected "Free Radicals" as its theme, referring to independent-minded filmmakers who often draw fierce reactions, drawing inspiration from the chemistry term that stands for "special atoms or molecules that can function as links in processes and catalysts of change."

Profile | Fatih Akin

Fatih Akin was born in 1973 in Hamburg and began studying Visual Communications at Hamburg's College of Fine Arts in 1994. In 1995, he wrote and directed his first short feature, Sensin - You're The One! (Sensin - Du bist es!), which received the Audience Award at the Hamburg International Short Film Festival, followed by Weed (Getuerkt, 1996). His first full length feature film, Short Sharp Shock (Kurz und schmerzlos, 1998), won the Bronze Leopard at Locarno and the Bavarian Film Award (Best Young Director) in 1998. His other films include: In July (Im Juli, 2000), Wir haben vergessen zurueckzukehren (2001), Solino (2002), the Berlinale Golden Bear-winner and winner of the German and European Film Awards Head-On (Gegen die Wand, 2003), Crossing the Bridge - The Sound of Istanbul (2005), and The Edge of Heaven (Auf der anderen Seite, 2007).

2008 | Chico by Özgür Yildirim

The latest corazón-production CHIKO, a first feature film by Özgür
Yildirim, will be premiered at the Berlinale 08 in the Panorama section


Chico Germany 2007/2008, Feature Film
Credits
Director Özgür Yildirim
Screenplay Özgür Yildirim
Director of photography Matthias Bolliger
Cast :
Denis Moschitto Chiko
Moritz Bleibtreu Brownie
Volker Özcan Tibet
Philipp Baltus Scholle
Jelica Batarilo Schwester Jessica
Fahri Ögün Yardim Curly

Production company:Corazón International GmbH & Co. KG (Hamburg)
Producer Fatih Akin; Klaus Maeck

Özgür Yildirim
born 1979 Hamburg

2007/2008 Chiko
Screenplay,Director
2004 Alim Market
Director
2003 Der nötige Schneid/Under the Knife
Director

Article | Fatih Akin's projects cross borders

Fatih Akin's projects cross borders

German-Turk has two films in the Oscar race

By ALI JAAFAR

Crossing borders comes naturally to Fatih Akin.

The Teuton-Turkish multitasking multihyphenate has two films in the race for a best foreign language Oscar nomination -- Germany's "Edge of Heaven," which he helmed, and Turkey's "Takva" which he co-produced. But he's also got a slew of other projects under way, not all of them as a producer or director.

While he's busy helming "Garbage in the Garden of Eden," a years-in-the-making doc about the impact of the Turkish government's policy of using an idyllic Turkish village as a landfill site, he's also collaborating with Martin Scorsese at the World Cinema Foundation, a nonprofit org dedicated to restoring lost world cinema treasures.

Akin's Hamburg-based shingle Corazon is also hard at work on developing a number of the helmer's own projects -- including a proposed biopic of legendary Kurdish filmmaker Yilmaz Guney (who won the 1982 Palm d'Or for "Yol" before dying of cancer in 1984) and the final part of Akin's proposed "Love, Death and the Devil" trilogy -- as well as boosting film industry ties between Germany and Turkey.

The globetrotting exploits of the 34-year-old Hamburg-born son of Turkish immigrants, who won the 2004 Golden Bear at Berlin for "Head-On," are reflected in his work. "Edge of Heaven," which won screenplay awards at this year's Cannes fest and European Film Awards, travels between Germany and Turkey with its meditations of East-West miscommunication and the fractured intersecting lives of a group of ordinary Germans and Turks drawn together by extraordinary events.

Akin has taken an innovative approach to tubthumping the pic in Germany.

"I've toured all over Germany with the film, not just in the big cinemas but in the tiny villages, too," he says. "For a long time, there was this idea that to be a German citizen you had to have German blood. This is a very old-fashioned idea. I am a Turkish-German filmmaker, which means I am a bastard of two cinemas."

Akin's decision to embark on a grassroots campaign to drum up support for his pic may be one of the reasons why Teuton auds have taken the pic -- as much Turkish as it is German -- to their hearts.

As the poster-boy for European multiculturalism, the wunderkind is doing more than most in the film biz to rep a positive face for Turkey as the country's discussions to join the European Union inch ahead amid criticism from some quarters in the West over the nation's human rights record.

"I wanted to add an extra dimension and perspective to how the media have presented Turkey joining the European Union, as I feel that their view can be at times limited," he says.

But he acknowledges the challenges Turkey is facing. The internal battle over the future of the country between the secular traditionalists -- who founded modern-day Turkey in 1923 under the leadership of Kemal Ataturk -- and the current ruling AK party -- whose leaders are devout Muslims -- has been overshadowed by a rise in anti-Kurdish nationalism. The Turkish military's air strikes in December against suspected Kurdish rebel bases in northern Iraq, in retaliation for a series of attacks this year against Turkish targets, threatens to further destabilize a region already reeling from violence.

The situation in Turkey has brought up an ironic, and unwanted, comparison with a dark chapter in the history of Akin's adopted home. "It's like Germany in 1935. This buildup creates anger against Kurdish people," Akin says. "Kurdish people are getting hit in the street, getting their windows smashed. Cinema is a reflection of society, and what I like about Turkish films right now is their dialogue is forcing audiences to deal with these issues."

One such film is "Takva."

Akin's involvement with "Takva," about a devout Muslim living in Istanbul who finds his faith devastatingly tested when he takes on a job as a rent collector for his local imam, was crucial to the film getting made. With a modest budget of $1.6 million, the Turkish side had managed to raise 80% of the financing. It was the friendship between Onder Cakar, who penned the screenplay, and Akin that led to the all-important final coin arriving from funding body Eurimages as well as the Hamburg Film Fund via Akin's shingle Corazon.

The expansion from auterism -- Akin writes and directs all his own projects -- into producing is a longterm shift for the breathless maven. "I love the fact that with producing I can protect my own work. That's why I became a producer," Akin says. "As a filmmaker, you have a story to tell, but maybe one day I won't have anything more to say. At least I'll still have producing left as an option. It's like gambling. You put money in a slot machine and suddenly you have a project."

Spiegel Interview with Fatih Akin

September 28, 2007
Interview conducted by Lars-Olav Beier and Matthias Matussek
SPIEGEL INTERVIEW WITH DIRECTOR FATIH AKIN
From Istanbul to New York

German director Fatih Akin, who shot to fame with his 2004 hit "Head-On," talks about Turkish-German filmmaking, his fondness for Istanbul and how his new film, "The Edge of Heaven," only worked when he introduced a lesbian love affair to the plot.

SPIEGEL: Fatih Akin, you have been compared with (legendary German film director) Rainer Werner Fassbinder for your new film, "The Edge of Heaven," which won the prize for best screenplay at the Cannes Film Festival and is now rumored to be an Oscar contender. Are you pleased?

Akin: The comparisons with Fassbinder have followed me around since my first film, "Short Sharp Shock." Critics said that the character Gabriel, who emerges from prison determined never to return to crime, reminded them of Franz Biberkopf in Fassbinder's "Berlin Alexanderplatz." It's funny, because I hadn't even seen the film at the time. I admire Fassbinder, but he and I work in very different ways.

SPIEGEL: How so?

Akin: (German actress) Hanna Schygulla once told me that Fassbinder forced his actors never to deviate from the script. But in my films everyone can do as he or she wishes. I like it when actors depart from the script to find their characters. Of course, that's also why it takes me three years to make a movie. Fassbinder would have been able to turn out 10 films in that amount of time.

SPIEGEL: In 1973, when Fassbinder shot his melodrama "Ali: Fear Eats the Soul," about a love affair between a Moroccan immigrant and a German cleaning woman, some in Germany were still referring to Turks as "foreign workers."

Akin: And SPIEGEL wrote at the time: "The Turks are coming -- save yourself if you can." I know, because I've researched it. It was in July 1973. I was born in Hamburg one month later.

SPIEGEL: And now you're here.

Akin: Exactly. And today we no longer tell our stories from the margins, but from the center of society.

SPIEGEL: And yet "The Edge of Heaven" describes, just as your film "Head-On" did, migration in exactly the opposite direction. Your characters leave Germany to go to Turkey. A Turkish-German professor of German Studies and a German student travel to Istanbul, for example.

Akin: Sure, why not? I feel incredibly comfortable here, and I also feel that it's my home. If the characters returned to Germany, perhaps the ending would be neater. But I like open endings.

SPIEGEL: Your characters are repeatedly drawn to Istanbul. Is it a city that you have a longing for?

Akin: That comes from my childhood, when my entire family made the trek by car down to Turkey. The trip took three or four days. When we arrived in Istanbul, I felt like I had traveled halfway around the earth and had landed in a completely different world. Nowadays Istanbul is much closer, and so it's no longer a place I miss so much. But it is a city where everything is constantly in motion.

SPIEGEL: Do you see yourself as a role model of Turkish emancipation?

Akin: No, although I do like the fact that people in Turkey are proud of me. On the other hand, I haven't done anything yet that portrays Turkey in a bad light. I haven't burned any bridges the way (Turkish author and Nobel Prize winner) Orhan Pamuk did. Maybe it'll happen someday, or perhaps Turkey will change enough so that burning bridges is no longer possible.

SPIEGEL: But is it possible that you actually portray Turkey in too positive a light? For example, you depict a women's prison with brightly lit, spacious group cells and inmates enjoying a game of volleyball in the prison yard.

Akin: We did a lot of research in Turkish prisons. I was keenly aware of the fact that I couldn't afford any inaccuracies. I wanted my work to be unassailable, and for that reason I had many conversations with friends of mine who were in fact imprisoned in Turkey for political reasons. We ended up shooting the scene in a prison in Istanbul for people being held on remand. What you see in the film are real prisoners and real guards. We didn't try to make Turkey more attractive than it is.

SPIEGEL: Does Turkey demand different images from you than Germany does?

Akin: Absolutely. I shot many scenes of Hamburg, albums full of postcard motifs, and I discarded almost all of them. I ride my bike through Hamburg every day. I go shopping here, I go to the doctor -- and yet I no longer have the eye for telling stories about this damn city, even though I love it. But in Turkey I have the feeling that I'm seeing everything with different eyes.

SPIEGEL: In "The Edge of Heaven," you tell the story of a lesbian love affair between a German and a Turkish woman. How did your parents feel about it?

Akin: Oh, they know what sort of a son they have by now. Why two women? Because everything else felt like a cliché. A young, dark-haired Turk comes to Hamburg, where he falls in love with an innocent blonde? No, that's too much like King Kong and the white woman. The story only became sexy once two women were involved.

SPIEGEL: Do you plan to tell a German-Turkish story again in your next film?

Akin: No, all roads lead to America. I'm planning a film about European immigrants who went to the United States in the early 20th century. We want to reconstruct Ellis Island in (the Potsdam film studio) Babelsberg. But after New York we'll be going to the Southwest. There will even be Indians. It'll be my first Western.

ABOUT FATIH AKIN
Fatih Akin is a German film director of Turkish descent. He was born in Hamburg in 1973 and studied visual communications at the city's College of Fine Arts. He made his first film, "Short Sharp Shock," in 1998 and won the Golden Bear award at the Berlin Film Festival with his 2004 film "Head- On," which brought him to the attention of international audiences. His latest film, "The Edge of Heaven," won the Best Screenplay Award at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival.

Article | A Hand That Links Germans and Turks

A Hand That Links Germans and Turks
By NICHOLAS KULISH
Published: January 6, 2008

FATIH AKIN has earned the right to be a little exasperated about the constant focus on his Turkish-German identity.

“Imagine I’m a painter, and we speak more about the background of the paintings than the foreground of the paintings, or we speak about the framing but not about the painting,” said Mr. Akin, a German film director and the son of Turkish immigrants. “For sure this is frustrating, and for sure that’s why I will leave it behind sooner or later.”

But he has not yet abandoned the journeys between Germany and Istanbul that have stood at the center of several of his films — including the breakout success in Europe of his dark, violent love story, “Head-On.” With his latest feature, “The Edge of Heaven,” Mr. Akin has created another film of similar geography but with a very different emotional landscape. It is a movie as much about bridging the gap between generations — father and son, mother and daughter — as between nations and cultures. He has had success with this latest film, for which he was writer, director and a producer, despite enormous expectations at home after “Head-On,” not the least of which were his own.

The film has stood up to scrutiny. “The Edge of Heaven” won the screenwriting prize at Cannes, received critical acclaim in Germany and will represent the country in the competition to be nominated for best foreign-language film at the Academy Awards. The movie is scheduled to open in New York at Film Forum on May 21.

In the meantime Mr. Akin, 34, will travel to the United States this month for his first shoot there. “It makes no sense to love the cinema and not take the chance once you have the possibility to work there, to refuse it,” Mr. Akin said. “If you love the cinema, you have to love America.”

German directors have flocked to Hollywood in recent years — among them, Oliver Hirschbiegel, “The Invasion”; Robert Schwentke, “Flightplan”; and Mennan Yapo, “Premonition.” Though he has had offers, Mr. Akin has not succumbed — and says he will not — to the allure or the financial payoff of a big Hollywood production, as so many of his countrymen have.

“I come from this European auteur thing,” Mr. Akin said. “I’m producing the stuff I’m doing, I’m writing the stuff I’m doing, I’m directing the stuff I’m doing. In the end it’s me on the front line, you know?”

Instead of going to Hollywood, he is making a short film called “Chinatown” for “New York, I Love You,” a follow-up to “Paris, Je T’Aime,” the collection of 18 vignettes that opened in New York last year. “That the first thing I do is, like, a five-minute film on U.S. ground, that feels healthy in a way,” Mr. Akin said in an interview here at the office of his production company, Corazón International.

Beyond his experience as a director, Mr. Akin has worked as a producer, through Corazón, on the Turkish director Ozer Kiziltan’s film “Takva,” also providing technical support in sound and editing. Mr. Akin said he was moved by its story of a humble, religious Turk forced to confront the material world by his promotion to rent collector for his religious group’s properties.

“If Fatih wasn’t involved in the project, it wouldn’t be that successful on the international side,” Mr. Kiziltan said on a sunny afternoon in Istanbul, where he was filming a television show. “If you showed the film with the first script to producers here, they say you can’t find the financing. Now everybody is saying they wish it was their film.” In addition to Germany’s nod for “The Edge of Heaven,” Turkey chose “Takva” for the Oscar foreign-language competition, a double for Mr. Akin.

A gifted raconteur in German and English, Mr. Akin is energetic and quickly engaging. Past collaborators describe his ability to communicate as one of his greatest strengths as a director. Mr. Akin is still based here in Hamburg, where he was born. His offices are just off a stretch of waterfront where a seven-ton anchor stands as a monument to this northern port city’s lifeblood: shipping. On the block sit a string of Portuguese restaurants and a red-brick church built to minister to Scandinavian seafarers a hundred years ago.

It was here that Mr. Akin set his first feature-length movie, “Short Sharp Shock,” a “Mean Streets”-style look at three friends — one Turkish, one Greek and one Serbian — trying to get ahead, or at least survive. He was just 19 when he wrote the screenplay and brought it to the German independent production company Wüste Film, hoping for a movie he could star in. Mr. Akin had been taking small acting roles and was disappointed with the stereotypical hoodlums he was asked to portray. The producers were trying out another director and got the idea of putting Mr. Akin behind the camera.

He had been operating a boom at a test shooting at a beach, remembered Ralph Schwingel, a producer at Wüste. Mr. Schwingel said he asked Mr. Akin what he was doing. The young man answered that he was figuring out how he would shoot the scene if he were the director.

“He was drawing the characters in the sand and wondering where he would put the camera,” Mr. Schwingel said. Using his own money, Mr. Schwingel paid for Mr. Akin to write and direct a short film, so he could learn the craft and also convince potential financial backers that he could pull off a feature. The result was “Short Sharp Shock” in 1998.

The film could have disappeared in the sea of Quentin Tarantino-inspired movie violence produced in the late ’90s, but quiet moments between the Turkish father and his troubled son stand out as more powerful than any spurts of blood in the finale.

“That he was unusually talented was clear very quickly,” said Mr. Schwingel’s partner, Stefan Schubert. The movie was a typical debut, well received but hardly a hit, Mr. Schubert said. In his eyes what set Mr. Akin apart from other German directors was that “he is not afraid to put feelings up on the screen.”

Mr. Akin demonstrated that clearly (if not completely successfully) in his second full-length film, “In July,” a romantic comedy about a German man following a Turkish woman from Hamburg to Istanbul. In his review in The New York Times, A. O. Scott wrote, “Mr. Akin pursues his happy, silly love story without embarrassment, and ‘In July’ is ultimately more endearing than irritating.” But it hardly seemed to herald the arrival of a great director. Neither did the follow-up, “Solino,” about a family of Italian immigrants in Germany.

Then came the surprise triumph of “Head-On,” which won the top prize, the Golden Bear, at the Berlin International Film Festival. Mr. Akin was unprepared for the celebrity it brought him in Germany as well as in Turkey. He was instantly seen as a cultural spokesman, far beyond his role as a filmmaker, to a large extent because of his Turkish roots, at a time when Germans were re-examining their complex relationship with their country’s large Muslim minority. About 2.7 million people of Turkish descent live in Germany today.

Speaking of “Head-On” and the Golden Bear, Dieter Kosslick, director of the Berlin International Film Festival, said, “In a way it was the perfect award because it shows a little bit also the change of our country and the change of our people’s mood about people who have come from different countries.”

Brought over as so-called guest workers decades ago, most of the Turkish migrants never went home. But as a group they have not been embraced by mainstream German society.

For Mr. Akin, who was 30 when he won the Golden Bear, it was hard enough to be the pride of one nation; he had to learn to thrive under the pressure of two and at the same time try to avoid the position of spokesman that had been thrust upon him.

Slouching on a sofa in his office, swaddled in youthful, baggy clothes and tired from the hectic schedule of the international rollout for “The Edge of Heaven,” Mr. Akin seemed far less like a man taking a victory lap than one relieved of a burden but still exhausted from it.

“Until ‘Head-On’ I exactly knew what I was going to do next,” he said. “I’m working on a film, and during the work on that film I knew what would be the next film. But with ‘Head-On’ it was not like that.”

“The more success the film had, the more nervous I became.”

He dealt with the problem in part by making his well-received documentary about music in Istanbul, ”Crossing the Bridge,” instead of beginning another feature.

Ultimately, though, he started to work on “The Edge of Heaven.” In the film a young Turkish-German man goes to Istanbul to find a murdered woman’s daughter, only to decide to stay in Turkey, his father’s homeland, and run a German bookstore in the city. In another strand of the story, a young German woman travels to Istanbul after her lover, a Turkish woman rejected for asylum by Germany and forced to serve prison time.

The film is marked by sudden, unexpected deaths. When tragedy befalls one of the young women, the German girl’s mother, played by the German actress Hanna Schygulla, travels to Istanbul also. Often called Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s muse, Ms. Schygulla, according to many critics, turned in the most affecting performance in the movie.

“It’s a very mature script,” Ms. Schygulla said by telephone from Paris. “I was amazed about that.”

Speaking of Mr. Akin, she said: “He’s a very natural boy. He’s not a boy; he’s a man. But he still has kept something of a boy.” It is a feeling she wants him to hold onto. “I hope he doesn’t get deformed by his success, that he stays the authentic boy he is,” she added.

“The Edge of Heaven” has its similarities in theme and some settings to “Head-On,” but it also reflects a more mature approach. The focus on parents and children may stem from Mr. Akin’s experience of becoming a father in 2005, when he and his wife had a son.

Still, “The Edge of Heaven” takes up the subject of cultural conflict for Turkish migrants that played to such powerful effect in “Head-On.” Those conflicts are universal, Mr. Akin insisted, rather than specific to the two countries. Mr. Akin, whose wife is of Mexican heritage, said that he feels great kinship with the Mexican filmmakers Guillermo Arriaga and Alfonso Cuarón.

“What I’m always trying to say is, this Turkish-German gap, you know, or this connecting element of the two nations, or systems, or worlds — you can change that and put other things instead,” Mr. Akin said. “Mexico and the U.S., same thing.”

2007 Hidden Faces by Handan Ipekci

Original Title:Sakli Yüzler
Genre:Drama
Produktion Year:2007
Country:Turkey, Germany
Production:Yeni Yapim Film
Co-Production:Tradewid Pictures, Bir Film
Cast:Senay Aydin, Istar Gökseven, Berk Hakman,
Cem Bender
Nisa Yildirim
Dilan Erçetin
Füsun Demirel
Bahar Aydin
Asli Öngören
Necmettin Çobanoglu
Crew:
Producer
Handan Ipekçi
Co Producer
Helmut G.Weber, Thomas Springer, Ersan Çongar
Screenplay
Handan Ipekçi
Photography
Feza Çaldiran, Ümit Ardabak
Editor
Aytekin Birkon, Natalin Solakoglu, Handan Ipekçi
Language:
Turkish, German
Technical Details:
127 min, 35mm, 1:1,85, color&b/w, Dolby Digital
Hidden Faces
A documentary filmmaker unwittingly reignites a murderous vendetta that prompts an honor-obsessed man to track down his niece, whom he blames for soiling the family´s honor.
Horror, disbelief, enthrallment - the emotions flickering on the faces of the viewers in the theater speak volumes. They are watching the Turkish documentary �Honor Killings - A Violation of Human Rights�. The 'heroine' is Zurhe, a young woman from rural Turkey who loved the local shepherd and had a child from him before he abandoned her. To restore the family's honor, Zurhe�s uncle Ali forces her 17-year-old brother Ismail to strangle the baby in front of her eyes. Zurhe herself is the next to die, but instead of killing her, her father kills himself. When an enlightened uncle from Germany comes to take her with him, he too is killed by the family's men - bloodshed blamed on the underage Ismail, who is only given a five-year sentence. Finally, Zurhe is shot and left for dead. But she survives and, thanks to a kindly lawyer, begins a new life with a new identity in a town near Istanbul. By participating in the documentary, Zurhe wants to help prevent such honor killings. Unfortunately, her uncle Ali sees the film and is determined to finish the job he began several years ago ...
Known for her socio-critical films, award-winning Turkish filmmaker Handan İpekçi has crafted a searing indictment of honor killings and a suspenseful, intricately constructed crime drama with an exciting race-against-time component.

Director Handan Ipekci :
In Turkey, under the guise of 'cleaning the honor', violence is used against women, and many
women are murdered for dishonoring their families. In a way, the violence used against women
ultimately turn

Handan Ipekci
After studying radio and television at the Faculty of Communication of Gazi University, Ipekçi had her first experience of directing in 1993, when she made the documentary “Kemencenin Turkusu” (“Song of the Kemence). The following year, in 1994, she shot her first feature “Babam Askerde” (“Dad is in the Army”). In her latest feature “Büyük Adam Küçük Ask” (Hejar) Ýpekci won 21 awards over the world and “Büyük Adam Küçük Ask” was released in Germany, Englang and Japan, and it was shown in WDR in Germany.
Filmography
1993 KEMENÇENIN TÜRKÜSÜ / SONG OF THE KEMENÇE, Documentary
1994 BABAM ASKERDE / DAD IS IN THE ARMY, Feature
2001 BÜYÜK ADAM KÜÇÜK ASK / HEJAR, Feature

Contact: Klaus Rasmussen
Sales Manager
Phone +49 89 6499 3727
Fax +49 89 6499 3720
klaus.rasmussen@bavaria-film.de

Review | 2007 Gezici Festival at Kars

Festival puts on a Wheel-y good show
Turkey takes cinema on the road
By JAY WEISSBERG
KARS, Turkey -- No other festival on earth covers as many miles as Turkey's Festival on Wheels -- more than 25,000 of them by the organizers' reckoning.

Now in its 13th year, the budget is still tight but its success rate in creating audiences and bringing good cinema to provincial cities is nothing short of impressive.

After debuting in Ankara each year, the show literally hits the road, traveling to various regions not just in Turkey but, in recent editions, further afield including Tbilisi, Gerogia.

One city is designated the international hub where filmmakers, journalists and industry folk gather for screenings and workshops. For the past four years Kars, on the Turkish-Armenian border, has been that place.

"When we first came to Kars there were no cinemas," says fest director Basak Emre, so they brought their own 35mm projector and set up screenings in the local community hall.

The festival was such a success with the locals that Mayor Naif Alibeyoglu, a big supporter, had the hall fitted out with projectors, a good screen and Dolby digital so the city now has a fulltime cinema for the first time in years.

Made famous by "Snow," the novel by Nobel Prize winner Orhan Pamuk, Kars bears little resemblance to its fictional namesake, and its liberal atmosphere has proved a fertile ground for an appreciation of the European films at the core of the fest.

This year's edition, which ran Nov. 2-25, in Ankara, Kars, Samsun and Sarajevo, included Estonian pic "The Class," Romania's "The Rest is Silence" and Israel's "My Father, My Lord," as well as recent Turkish pics and a smattering of classics from Bresson to Antonioni.

Not all cities have always been so welcoming and others took time to nurture an audience.

"No one came from Bursa the first year there" recalls Emre, but repeat editions proved enormously popular with the locals.

Funding for this ambitious undertaking comes from a variety of national and regional sources as well as the fest's fairy godmother of sorts, Norwegian oil company Statoil.

Hidden Faces |Sakli Yuzler by Handan Ipekci

Reviewed at Kars By JAY WEISSBERG (Variety)

Hidden Faces | Sakli Yuzler (Turkey-Germany)

A Yeni Yapim Film (Turkey)/Tradewind Pictures (Germany) production. (International sales: Bavaria Film Intl., Munich.) Produced by Handan Ipekci, Helmut G. Weber, Ersan Congar. Coproducer, Hamide Kecin Hurma. Directed, written by Handan Ipekci.

With: Senay Aydin, Istar Gokseven, Berk Hakman, Cem Bender, Nisa Yildirim, Fusun Demirel, Dilan Ercetin, Bahar Aydin, Asli Ongoren, Necmettin Cobanoglu, Muhammed Cangoren, Kemal Ulusoy, Tanya Barut.

Maverick distaff helmer Handan Ipekci again tackles big issues with her melodramatic but important expose on honor killings, "Hidden Faces." Unlikely to generate the kind of censorship provoked by her previous pic, "Hejar," which dealt with the taboo subject of Turkish-Kurdish relations yet still proved extremely popular, the current work is unabashedly mainstream in its overwrought treatment of a woman's escape from her family's vengeance. Popular style targets unsophisticated auds, making international fests, other than those with human-rights themes, unlikely takers.

Frequent time shifts are clumsily edited as the story of Zuhre (Senay Aydin) unfolds. A teen from a rural town in Turkey, she's fallen in love with a local boy and had the audacity to sleep with him and get pregnant. When the family finds out, they force her gentle brother Ismail (sensitive heartthrob Berk Hakman) to strangle the baby, then send him out to shoot Zuhre on her way to school.

But Ismail can't go through with the horrific deed, and helps Zuhre escape. Flash forward five years to Germany, and the brother (Cem Bender) of Zuhre's former b.f. makes a documentary about the attempted honor killing. Scrupulously staying undercover for fear of giving away Zuhre's new identity, he can't help tormenting Zuhre's uncle Ali (Istar Gokseven) with the news of her escape.

Now a respected leader in Germany's Turkish community, Ali still believes his family's honor needs avenging.

Chilling statistics at the finale reveal the disturbing number of honor killings still practiced in Turkey, making "Hidden Faces" especially relevant at home. For everyone else, TV stylizations and predictable developments are unlikely to impress, though the overall force of the story still gets driven home.

Thesping largely avoids histrionics: Hakman, with his large, puppy-dog eyes reflecting a world of pain, is especially effective, and Nisa Yildirim, as Zuhre's strong-willed aunt, carries a force generally lacking in other players. Visuals tend to be bright and unremarkable.

Camera (color, mini-DV, HD-to-35mm), Feza Caldiran, Umit Ardabak; editor, Aytekin Birkon, Ipekci, Natalin Solakoglu; music, Anima; production designers, Deniz Ozen, Esra Yildiz; sound, Umut Senyol, Dinos Kitou. Reviewed at Festival of European Films on Wheels, Kars, Turkey, Nov. 11, 2007. (Also in Thessaloniki Film Festival -- Balkan Survey.) Running time: 127 MIN.

2007 Eurimages support for 4 Turkish Directors

Eurimages [1] Co-production support – Year 2007
Last update : 20.12.2007
Feature films (56) : 21 060 000 €
Documentaries (5) : 448 000 €
Total Amount (61) : 21 508 000 €

Adalet By Ali Ozgenturk (Turkey)
Feature Film
Awarded: 150 000 €
Co-producers:
ASYA FILM FILMCILIK TICARET VE SAN LTD. STI (TR)
UJ BUDAPEST FILMSTUDIO KFT (HU)

Hayaller By Nuri Bilge Ceylan (Turkey)
Feature Film
Awarded: 235 000 €
Co-producers:
YUZLER SESLER OYUNCULUK FILM / NBC Film (TR)
PYRAMIDE PRODUCTION (FR)
BIM DISTRIBUZIONE Srl (IT)

Hayat Var By Reha Erdem (Turkey)
Feature Film
Awarded: 200 000 €
Co-producers:
ATLANTIK FILM YAPIM Ltd. As. (TR)
CINEGRAM / CINEPOS (GR)
KABOAL Ltd (BG)

Pandoranin Kutusu English title : Pandora's Box
French title : La boîte de Pandorre
By Yesim Ustaoglu (Turkey)
Feature Film
Awarded: 200 000 €
Coproducers:
USTAOGLU FILMS (TR)
LES PETITES LUMIERES / SILKROAD PRODUCTION (FR)

[1] Eurimages is the Council of Europe fund for the co-production, distribution and exhibition of European cinematographic works. Set up in 1988 as a Partial Agreement it currently has 33 Member States. Eurimages aims to promote the European film industry by encouraging the production and distribution of films and fostering co-operation between professionals.

Profile | Mesut Kara

MESUT KARA


He was born in 1961 in Istanbul. Besides his literature works, he is a cinema writer for 15 years. Mesut Kara who is an Art Director in advertising sector, also produced programs about cinema. He has published two books named “Artizler Kahvesi” (Artists’ Coffeehouse) and “Yeşilçam’da Unutulmayan Yüzler” (Unforgettable faces in Yeşilcam). He has been writer and editor in many magazines. He is a text writer and consultant in a Cinema Program named in Cinema Show broadcasted on Show TV. He took responsibility for preparation and presentation of a cinema program named Hayalet Mektebi (School of Ghosts) broadcasted on Kanal 6. He was an editor-in-chief and page designer in Literature magazine named “Uç”. As of November 2007 he is the publisher of Cinemascope Dergisi,with a board of writers such as Prof. Dr. Oğuz Makal, Engin Ayça, Ahmet Soner, Taner Ay, Orhan Ünser and Barış Bardakçı

Filmography;

Yılmaz Güney Documentary (Director and Text Writer)
Erkan Yücel Documentary (Director and Text Writer)
“Unutulmayan Yüzler” (Unforgettable Faces) documentary series about the old-time Turkish actors, including Sezer Sezin, Belgin Doruk, Ayhan Işık, Bülent Oran, Hayati Hamzaoğlu, Turgut Özatay.
JUST PASSED FROM HERE |Simdi Gecti Buradan (Director and Text Writer)
Documentary. 2005, 60 minutes| In Turkish with English subtitles
Art adventure and biography of Erkan Yucel who is unforgettable face of cinema and legendary actor of theatre...

All time B.O. spectator ranking (as of November 2006)

1- Kurtlar Vadisi-Irak 4.255.181
2- G.O.R.A. 4.001.711
3- Babam ve Oğlum 3.813.437
4- Vizontele 3.308.383
5- Vizontele Tuuba 2.894.802
6- Organize İşler 2.610.563
7- Hababam Sınıfı Askerde 2.586.132
8- Eşkıya 2.568.339
9- Kahpe Bizans 2.472.162
10- Hababam Sınıfı Üç Buçuk 2.067.661

BBC Four World Cinema Award nominates Climates (Iklimler) by Nuri Bilge Ceylan

The BBC Four World Cinema Award is an annual prize given out to celebrate the best in world cinema. A shortlist of six films is made by the UK's leading critics, film-school heads and festival directors from the foreign language films released in that year in the UK. The winner is selected by a panel of judges whose decision making process is screened as part of the award ceremony, screened live on BBC Four.

Now entering its fifth year, the BBC Four World Cinema Award ceremony has been hosted by Jonathan Ross from the BFI Southbank in London since the beginning. This year's award will be announced on Wednesday 30 January 2008, and broadcast on BBC Four Saturday 2 February 2008

2008 Nominees: The Lives Of Others (Das Leben Der Anderen), Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, Germany; The Science Of Sleep (La Science Des Rêves), Michel Gondry, France/Italy/USA; Climates (Iklimler), Nuri Bilge Ceylan, Turkey/France; Pan's Labyrinth (El Laberinto del Fauno), Guillermo del Toro, Mexico/Spain/USA; Syndromes And A Century (Sang Sattawat), Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Thailand/France/Austria

Cannes 2007 Review "The Edge of Heaven "

The Edge of Heaven By Ray Bennett
Bottom Line: Intricate and moving drama about life's struggles and near misses.

May 24, 2007

Akin's tale is about two families whose fate becomes entwined.

CANNES -- Director Fatih Akin continues his insightful exploration of the things that divide and bridge different cultures and generations in his absorbing In Competition film "The Edge of Heaven." Like his 2004 Berlin Golden Bear winner "Head-On," the film deals with Turkish folk living in Germany but this time he brings his story back to Istanbul. Love was his topic in the earlier film, and now Akin turns his attention to death. It may not be a wise thing to label the major chapters announcing the deaths of key characters, but he tells their stories with flair and compassion. Audiences that responded to "Head-On" will be pleased with "Heaven," and festival and art house prospects look good.The director, who also wrote the script, achieves a keen-eyed view of the Turkish expatriates in this film while sustaining his remarkable ability to make them universal. His tale is about two families whose fate becomes entwined in ways they don't discover within the time frame of the film.It starts in Germany with Turkish immigrant Ali (Tuncel Kurtiz), a crusty retired widower whose son Nejat (Baki Davrak) is a successful academic. Uncouth but charismatic, Ali still seeks pleasures of the flesh, which is how he meets Yeter (Nursel Kose), a severely beautiful Turkish woman who works in a brothel. Taken with her charms and pleased to be speaking his native tongue, Ali proposes that he become her sole customer and asks her to move in with him.
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Cannes 2007 Review "Egg/Yumurta"

Egg/Yumurta By Duane Byrge

Bottom Line: Saadet Askoy lights up an otherwise dull and dim drama.May 24, 2007

CANNES -- Yusuf, a withdrawn poet living in Istanbul, returns to his tiny hometown for his mother's funeral. He's been distanced, not only geographically but emotionally: Yusuf has not kept close contact with his mother. Basically, he's sort of a somnambulist. Nothing much arouses him, though we give him the benefit of the doubt that his stoic demeanor at his mother's funeral really masks deep grief.Hoping to get back to his solitary life as a used book store owner, Yusuf is nonetheless distracted by the vibrant beauty Ayla, who has been caring for his mother the past several years. Despite his dour, uncommunicative ways, things meander forward with Ayla. Deadened by filmmaker Semih Kaplanoglu's drab aesthetic, "Yumurta" seems unlikely to travel beyond the borders of Turkey where, evidently, Turks will appreciate certain nuances. In pacing and vitality, this Directors' Fortnight entrant is almost as listless as its drab lead character. Plaudits to Saadet Askoy for her radiant turn as Ayla; she lights up an otherwise dull and dim drama.

Golden Globe considerations for Takva and Bliss

November 29, 2007 – 61 foreign language films have been qualified for “The 65th Annual Golden Globe Awards” consideration honoring 2007 achievements, it was announced today by Jorge Camara, President of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association.

Bliss Turkey
Takva Turkey

Nominations for “The 65th Annual Golden Globe Awards” will be announced at 5:00 a.m. on Thursday, December 13. “The 65th Annual Golden Globe Awards” will take place Sunday, January 13, 2008 at The Beverly Hilton with a live telecast airing on NBC

Silver Caravelle to "YUMURTA"

EUROPEAN FILM FESTIVAL ESTORIL (Portugal) presented its first edition on 8-17 November 2007

JURY Miquel Barceló |Stéphane Braunschweig |Don DeLillo |Asia Argento |Ruy Duarte De Carvalho

AWARDS:GOLDEN CARAVELLE (30.000 euros)"TUSSENSTAND", Netherlands, Directed by Mijke de Jong
SILVER CARAVELLE (20.000 euros) "YUMURTA", Turkey, Greece, Directed by Semih Kaplanoglu

Competition Films
…A Bude Hur /Petr Nikolaev Czech Republic , 2007, 86’
Actrices /Valeria Bruni Tedeschi France, 2007, 107’
L'Été Indien /Alain Raoust France, 2007, 100’
Garage /Leonard Abrahamson Ireland, 2007, 85’
Gegenüber /Jan Bonny Germany, 2007, 100’
Gruz 200 /Aleksei Balabanov Russia, 2007, 89’
La Linea Recta /José María de Orbe Spain, 2006, 95’
Madonnen /Maria Speth Germany, Switzerland, Belgium, 2007, 125
Nu Te Supara, Dar… /Adina-Elena Pintilie Romania, 2007, 50’
Miehen Työ /Aleksi Salmenperä Finland, 2007, 100’
Yumurta /Semih Kaplanoglu Turkey, Greece, 2007, 97’
Sügisball /Veiko Õunpuu Estonia, 2007, 123’
Le Tueur /Cédric Anger France, 2007, 90’
Tussenstand /Mijke de Jong Netherlands, 2007, 80’

Awards | 3rd International Eurasia Film Festival

3rd International Eurasia Film Festival /Part of 44. Golden Orange FF 2007, Antalya, Turkey

Best Film "The Band's Visit" (Bikur Ha-tizmoret) Dir: Eran Kolirin
Best Director Abdellatatif Kechiche "The Secret of the Grain" (La Graine et le Mulet)
Critics' Award "Under the Bombs" (Sous les Bombes)
Netpac Award Two ex-aequo awards: "Egg" (Yumurta) and "Under the Bombs" (Sous Les Bombes"
International Eurasia Film Festival Script Development Award
50 Reasons All In Her Eyes Scriptwriter: Cem Akas

Awards | 44th Antalya Golden Orange Film Festival

44th Antalya Golden Orange Film Festival National Feature Film Competition Awards
Best Film "EGG" (Yumurta) Dir: Semih Kaplanoglu
Digiturk Behlül Dal Award for the Best Newcomer
Saadet Isil Aksoy (Actress) "EGG" (Yumurta)
Avni Tolunay Yurici Kargo Jury Special Recognition
"EDGE OF HEAVEN" (YASAMİN KİYİSİNDA / AUF DER ANDEREN SEITE)
Best Director Fatih Akin "EDGE OF HEAVEN" (YASAMİN KİYİSİNDA / AUF DER ANDEREN SEITE)
Best Actor Murat Han "BLISS" (MUTLULUK)
Best Actress Ozgu Namal "BLISS" (MUTLULUK)
Best Supporting Actor Tuncel Kurtiz "EDGE OF HEAVEN" (YASAMİN KİYİSİNDA / AUF DER ANDEREN SEITE)
Best Supporting Actress Nursel Kose "EDGE OF HEAVEN" (YASAMİN KİYİSİNDA / AUF DER ANDEREN SEITE)
Best Script "EGG" (Yumurta) Dir: Semih Kaplanoglu – Orcun Koksal
Best Cinematography Özgür Eken "EGG" (Yumurta)
Best Editing Andrew Bird "EDGE OF HEAVEN" (YASAMİN KİYİSİNDA / AUF DER ANDEREN SEITE)
Best Art Director Naz Erayda "EGG" (Yumurta)
Best Music Zulfu Livaneli "Bliss" (Mutluluk)
Best Sound Design Orcun Korluca "Bliss" (Mutluluk)
Best Special Effects No award given
Best Costume Design Naz Erayda "EGG" (Yumurta)
Best Make-Up & Hair Design Songül İbrahim, Suzan Kardeş "Fog and the Night" (Sis ve Gece)
Best Laboratory Safak Studios "Fog and the Night" (Sis ve Gece)

44th Antalya Golden Orange Film Festival National Short Film Competition
Best Short Film "Welcome to Baby" (Hosgeldin Bebek)

44th Antalya Golden Orange Film Festival National Documentary Film Competition
Best Documentary Award No award given

Inaugural 2007 Lux Prize to Fatih Akin's Film

Hans-Gert Pottering (r) giving the Lux prize to Hanna Schygulla and Klaus Maek, producer of Fatih Akin's "Auf des anderen seite". The new prize, the Prix LUX, was picked directly by the 785 elected members of the European Parliament in Brussels. The Parliament will then pay to subtitle and produce prints of the winning film in all 23 of the E.U.'s official languages.

Three films were contending for the first edition of the European Parliament's "Prix LUX" film prize, which wasawarded on 24 October during the October plenary session in Strasbourg. This prize - created by the European Parliament Bureau in 2006 and with which the Culture and Education Committee is closely associated - is awarded in recognition of films illustrating the values and diversity of European cultures or which inform debate on ideas about building Europe. Thre three films in contention for the 2007 prize were shown from 1 to 18 October at the European Parliament in Brussels.

They were:
-Auf der anderen Seite, by Fatih Akin (The Edge of Heaven)
-4 luni, 3 saptamini si 2 zile, by Cristian Mungiu (4 months, 3 weeks and 2 days)
-Belle toujours, by Manoel di Oliveira

All three were chosen, according to an E.U. spokesman, for their role in "illuminating the public debate on European integration." The politics are evident in Mungiu's drama, which follows two desperate women trying to arrange an illegal abortion amid the terror of the Chauchesku dictatorship. Or in Akin's multifaceted drama, which traces the lives of six people caught between the culture and politics that divide Turkey from Europe. There is less obvious politics in Oliveira's drama which is an update, 38 years later, of Luis Bunuel's erotic masterpiece "Belle de jour" (1967).

REES-465 | Selected Articles (PDF)

NEW ...Film Notes 1-12
ALL 12 NOTES PREPARED FOR REES-465

Plus Modern/Postmodern Philosophy and Film Theory
(click to download 11x17 chart in PDF)

PDF File 1
On Film narrative and Narrative meaning / George Wilson
Notes on Spectator Emotion and Ideological Film Criticism /Carl Plantinga
PDF File 2
The Matrix of Visual Culture/ Patricia Pisters
Chapter 6 (de)Terrorialising Forces of the Sound Machine
PDF File 3
Questions of Genre/ Steve Neale
Towards a Third Cinema/ Fernando Solanas and Octavio Gettino
PDF File 4
Deleuze’s Toolbox and Glossary to Cinema 1 and Cinema 2
PDF File 5
Remapping World Cinema / Identitiy, culture and politics in film
Towards a positive definition of World Cinema/Lucia Nagip
Consuming 'Bollywood' in the global age: the stange case of 'unfine' world cinema/Kushik Bhaumik
PDF File 6
The Real Gaze: Film Theory after Lacan
Introduction Todd McGowan

Young Turks of German Cinema

Young Turks of German Cinema (Download Power Point presentation) as presented at Goethe Institute in Washington DC

REES-465 | 7 PILLARS OF FILM WISDOM

NEW ...Film Notes 1-12

ALL 12 NOTES PREPARED FOR REES-465
Plus

Modern/Postmodern Philosophy and Film Theory
(click to download 11x17 chart in PDF)

Click on the image to download the latest PDF of the information chart
and
Click to get a PDF of Turkish Cinema History 1897-2006

The Ten Best Turkish Films of All Time (2003 Poll)

GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY REES-465
I LOST IT AT A TURKISH MOVIE

LECTURE (David Cuthell) WED 4:15-6:05 ICC 205B
SCREENING (Erju Ackman) TUE 6:15-8:15PM ICC 118

Takva nominated for European discovery award

Takva nominated for European discovery award

The director of Turkish movie "Takva", Ozer Kiziltan was nominated as a candidate for "European Discovery " award which is presented to promising directors within the scope of European Film Awards.

Jury members chose 4 among 63 movies for the nomination.

Other nominees are Eran Kolirin's "Bikur Ha-Tizmoret/The Band's Visit" (Israel), Anton Corbijn's "Control" (Britain) and Jan Bonny's "Gegenbe/Counterparts" (Germany).

1,800 members of European Film Academy will watch the movies and cast their votes on December 1st, 2007 in Berlin.

The Ten Best Turkish Films of All Time

"The Ten Best Turkish Films of All Time," selected by a poll organized among professionals of cinema by Ankara Cinema Association.
World Premire Karlovy Vary Film Festival/July 2004
Ten Best Turkish Film | Yol (1982)
Ten Best Turkish Film | Hope (1970)
Ten Best Turkish Film | Dry Summer (1964)
Ten Best Turkish Film | Herd (1979)
Ten Best Turkish Film | Mr. Muhsin (1987)
Ten Best Turkish Film | Innocence/Masumiyet(1997)
Ten Best Turkish Film | Bride (1973)
Ten Best Turkish Film | The Girl with the Red Scarf (1977)
Ten Best Turkish Film | Motherland Hotel (1986)
Ten Best Turkish Film | Distant/Uzak (2003)

Manaki Brothers | The birth of Ottoman Cinematography

Manaki Brothers | The birth of Ottoman Cinematography

Review | Screamers by Peter Debruge

Screamers | (Documentary -- U.K.) A Maya Releasing release of a BBC Television and the Raffy Manoukian Charity presentation of a MG2 Prods. production in association with Isis Prods. U.K. Produced by Nick de Grunwald, Tim Swain, Peter McAlevey, Carla Garapedian. Directed by Carla Garapedian.

With: Serj Tankian, Daron Malakian, Shavo Odadjian, John Dolmayan, Samantha Power, Stepan Haytayan, Maritza Ohanesian, Peter Galbraith, Salih Booker, Sibel Edmonds, Dennis Hastert.

By PETER DEBRUGE
'Screamers'
System of a Down lead singer Serj Tankian and his grandfather, Stepan Haytayan, reflect on their Armenian heritage in 'Screamers.'
What does metal band System of a Down have to do with the mass extermination of Armenians in 1915? Descended from survivors of the so-called "Armenian genocide," band members teamed with Armenian-American filmmaker Carla Garapedian and partner Peter McAlevey to make "Screamers," a soapbox doc that intercuts concert footage with talking heads and scenes of horrifying human atrocity. But a noble cause does not a good movie make. Pic repeatedly drowns its impassioned message with music, creating an awkward hybrid between history lesson and concert doc that will be a tough sell to either aud.

If the recent Dixie Chicks study "Shut Up & Sing" demonstrates how quickly the public can turn on artists for being politically outspoken, "Screamers" counters with a more optimistic view: System of a Down's fans actually expect a level of political activism from the band, who have made it their personal cause to spread awareness of the "ethnic cleansing" Hitler reportedly used as his model for the Holocaust. To this day, Turkey denies the "historical intrigue" of the deportations and massacres as a lie, prosecuting critics for denigrating "Turkishness," while U.S. and U.K. politicians resist officially recognizing the Armenian genocide.

With his Weird Al hair and King Tut goatee, lead singer Serj Tankian proves most eloquent on the subject. Docu shows Tankian reflecting on his heritage, both on the road and in conversation with his disabled grandfather, who shares stories of the long marches he endured as a child.

Pic's most surprising revelation concerns the extent to which System of a Down use their celebrity to draw attention to the issue (many of their songs address the subject directly), even going so far as to broadcast related news footage during their concerts and giving classroom lectures on the subject.

And yet, the movie scrambles the message. Every few minutes, just as the interview footage begins to gather momentum, another heavy-metal song rumbles to life, and Garapedian and editor Bill Yahraus whisk auds away again to an arena where goth kids are worshipping at the band's feet.

On one hand, System of a Down specifically wants the world to acknowledge the eradication of more than a million Armenians as "genocide," a semantic distinction that might pave the way to reparations. But pic doesn't define the term until 50 minutes in, and no sooner does it explain the "G word's" potential -- "If it's 'genocide,' then you have to do something about it" -- than it offers the counter-example: "The Bush administration seemed to think if they called it 'genocide,' then they were doing something."

"Screamers" begins to lose focus as montages take on the many calamities of the past century at once. Photos of forlorn Armenians and skin-and-bones corpses certainly turn the stomach, but pic's slideshow-of-horrors strategy blends them with images of the Holocaust and mass killings in Rwanda, Sarajevo, Srebenica and Darfur, making it tricky to distinguish one mass grave from another.

The effect, much like the band's music, is one of shock and rage. Instead of communicating the facts in an organized and effective way, the film embodies an emotional response to the atrocities. The band and crew seem to be venting their frustration, but auds seeking a provocative intellectual discourse would be better served by Atom Egoyan's "Ararat."

Most of the interviews with relevant politicians and activists take place primarily on park benches and noisy city streets, which gives the film a disorganized and almost impulsive feel, while fighter-jet clips and other anti-violence inserts have a way of upstaging the rocking concert footage.


Camera (color, HD), Charles Rose; editor, Bill Yahraus; music, Jeff Atmajian; music supervisor, Liz Gallacher; supervising sound editor, Vince Tennant; associate producers, Ara Sarafian, Eleanor Thomas. Reviewed on DVD, Los Angeles, Dec. 4, 2006. (In AFI Film Festival.) Running time: 91 MIN.

Review | Dol: The Valley of Tambourines by Derek Elley

Dol: The Valley of Tambourines |Dol |(France - Germany)
A NovoCine (in France)/Mitosfilm (in Germany) release of an HS Prods. (France)/Mitosfilm (Germany) production. (International sales: Mitosfilm, Berlin.) Produced by Hiner Saleem. Directed, written by Hiner Saleem.

With: Nazmi Kirik, Belcim Bilgin, Omer Ciaw Sin, Rojin Ulker, Tarik Akreyi, Ciwan Haco, Abdullah Keskin, Sipel Dogu Lesar Erdogan, Ayten Soykok, Sivan Selim, Taha Xelil, Bahman Haci, Sabr Abdurrahman.

By DEREK ELLEY
Iraqi-Kurdish director Hiner Saleem ("Kilometer Zero," "Vodka Lemon") doesn't have anything fresh to say in "Dol," another dramatic reverie on the plight of his people that is strictly fest fare for Middle East specialists. Shorn of the irony that enlivened his previous pics, drama-free item simply shuffles a group of characters who symbolize political and ethnic positions around a mountainous landscape where Turkey, Iraq and Iran meet.

During a wedding ceremony between Azad (Nazmi Kirik) and Nazenin (Sipel Dogu Lesar Erdogan) in the rocky village of Balliova (pop. 8,200), a fight breaks out after provocation by the Turkish military. Azad flees in a truck to Iraqi Kurdistan and meets various characters in the fluid society, where everyone from separatists to drug runners co-exist. There's Ceto (Abdullah Keskin), a Kurd from Paris visiting his family; Jekaf (Rojin Ulker), kidnapped as a teen by Iraqi soldiers; and the beautiful Taman (Belcim Bilgin), who intros Azad to guerrillas fighting the Iranian government. Dialogue is utilitarian ("Here our land is free. It's a new era for Kurdistan"), lensing of the scrubby landscape impressive in a static way. "Dol" is Kurdish for both "drums" and "valley."

Camera (color), Andreas Sinanos; editors, Dora Mantzoros, Bonita Papastathi; music, Ozgur Akgul, Mehmet Erdem, Vedat Yildirim; art director, Saman Sabunci; costumes, Belcim Bilgin. Reviewed at Berlin Film Festival (Forum), Dec. 12, 2007. Original Kurdish title: Dol. Kurdish, Turkish dialogue. Running time: 87 MIN.

Review | Bliss by Derek Elley

Bliss | Mutluluk (Turkey-Greece)
By DEREK ELLEY

An ANS presentation of an ANS Prods. (Turkey)/Highway Prods. (Greece) production. (International sales: ANS, Istanbul.) Produced by Abdullah Oguz. Co-producer, George Lykiardopoulos. Directed by Abdullah Oguz. Screenplay, Kubilay Tuncer, Elif Ayan, Oguz, based on the novel by Zulfu Livaneli.

With: Talat Bulut, Ozgu Namal, Murat Han, Mustafa Avkiran, Emin Gursoy, Sebnem Kostem, Meral Cetinkaya, Erol Babaoglu, Alpay Atalan, Idil Yener, Lena Leyla Basak, Kubilay Tuncer, Ali Zeytin, Ugur Izgi, Lale Mansur, Emel Goksu.

Traditional and modern mores in contempo Turkey cross paths in the strikingly lensed "Bliss," an upscale meller with shades of "Knife in the Water." Formulaic yarn about a disgraced Anatolian girl, her putative killer and an Istanbul sociology prof who find themselves cruising the Sea of Marmara in his luxury yacht is given dramatic heft by good perfs -- especially by actress du jour Ozgu Namal -- and careful direction by producer-helmer Abdullah Oguz. Given the international stature of composer-writer Zulfu Livaneli's original novel, accessible pic could even sail into limited theatrical ports as well as festival berths.

In the barren landscape of eastern Turkey, the unconscious body of 17-year-old Meryem (Namal) is brought back to the house of her father, Tahsin (Emin Gursoy), and harridan stepmother, Done (Sebnem Kostem). Meryem won't talk about what happened, but her family feels shamed by what they believe to be her compliant loss of chastity.

Ali Riza Amca (Mustafa Avkiran), Tahsin's cousin and the village's local bigshot, decrees she should pay for her "crime" according to ancient custom. He orders his son, Cemal (Murat Han), fresh out of military service, to take Meryem to Istanbul and quietly dispose of her en route. Meryem herself thinks she's being taken to meet Yakup (Erol Babaoglu), another of Ali Riza's sons, for an arranged marriage.

On the way, Cemal can't bring himself to bump off Meryem and, in Istanbul, is given a tongue-lashing by Yakup, who long ago broke free of the village and its crazy customs. But Cemal can't return until the job is done.

At this half-hour point, pic cuts to a wealthy Istanbul couple, Irfan (Talat Bulut) and Aysel (Lale Mansur), whose marriage has clearly stalled. In a development that the script doesn't prepare viewers for, Irfan just walks out of their snazzy home, leaving a note that he needs "a chance to breathe."

As Cemal and Meryem hide out at a remote fish farm, they cross paths with Irfan on his yacht. After joining him on his cruise, Meryem finds herself caught between the two men's growing affections for her, while, unknown to all, Ali Reza's men are hot on her trail.

Livaneli's original novel has been stripped of much of its political subtext and some of the two men's backgrounding, and the character of Meryem has been placed centerstage. But as a quality mainstream movie, it still works, thanks in no small part to Namal's sly perf as a browbeaten country lass who's still capable of humor and tenderness.

Thesp works well against Han's Cemal, a conflicted ex-army type given to sudden explosions of masculine prowess, and vet Bulut's sophisticated, avuncular Irfan. Director Oguz marbles the film with several lighter moments before the admirably brief climax and coda back in Anatolia, which is surprisingly moving.

Production values are tops, with eye-watering lensing by Bosnian d.p. Mirsad Herovic of locations in Marmara, Bodrum and Anatolia. Music by Livaneli himself adds further professional color.

Camera (color), Mirsad Herovic; editors, Levent Celebi, Oguz; music, Livaneli; art director, Tolunay Turkoz; sound (Dolby Digital), Konstantinos Kittou. Reviewed at Istanbul Film Festival (national competition), April 12, 2007. Running time: 128 MIN.

Review | Stolen Eyes (Otkradnati Ochi ) by Jay Weissberg

Stolen Eyes| Otkradnati Ochi
(Bulgaria-Turkey) A Gala Film (Bulgaria)/Yaka DDE Film (Turkey) production. (International sales: Gala, Sofia.) Produced by Galya Toneva, Kiril Kirilov, Atilla Yucer, Kerem Altug. Directed by Radoslav Spassov. Screenplay, Spassov, Neri Terzieva, based on an idea by Terzieva.

With: Valeri Yordanov, Vessela Kazakova, Nejat Isler, Itzhak Finzi, Iliana Kitanova, Stoyan Aleksiev, Maria Kavardjikova, Deyan Donkov, Anani Yavashev, Veliko Stoyanov, Nikolai Urumov, Vesselin Rankov, Rangel Vulchanov.
(Bulgarian, Turkish dialogue)

By JAY WEISSBERG
A black chapter in recent Bulgarian history is explored more with righteous sympathy than real power in "Stolen Eyes," a promising movie that tries to blend too many disparate elements. While ethnic cleansing in the former Yugoslavia was making headlines, Bulgaria's last communist rulers were forcing ethnic Turks to give up their identities. Pic follows a young Muslim widow -- the excellent Vessela Kazakova ("Mila from Mars") -- and the Bulgarian soldier who's smitten with her. Having won best Bulgarian feature award at the Sofia fest, pic could garner some fest exposure, despite its several flaws.

In the late '80s, Bulgarian strongman Todor Zhivkov declared a program of "national regeneration," in which the substantial Turkish minority was forced to change names, forbidden to show outward signs of ethnicity and outlawed from speaking Turkish. Anyone not complying was escorted to the border, which is at first open, then closed by the Turks due to swelling refugee camps. This is where "Stolen Eyes" begins, in 1989, with Aiten (Kazakova) and her brother, Halil (Nejat Isler), waiting to cross into Turkey.

Film then flashes back to soon after the laws have been announced. Young Bulgarian soldier Ivan (Valeri Yordanov) is put in charge of the official seals needed to certify name changes on newly issued identity cards. Aiten, a teacher, pretends to seduce Ivan in order to steal the seals, but he disarms her and in the process becomes fascinated by her courage and conviction.

Determined to continue protesting the government's identity rape, Aiten forcibly reopens a mosque and leads a group of women to block the army from entering the village. Ivan is the reluctant driver of the tank, and tragedy strikes when Aiten's daughter gets lost in the crowd and falls under the tank treads.

Traumatized Ivan is put in an institution, where he obsessively paints Aiten's eyes. She, too, is in the same hospital, but is unwilling to encourage the relationship he desires. After being discharged, Aiten is joined by her brother, and they head for the Turkish border, where the narrative began. But there's still one more stanza of the drama left to play.

Pic is at its best in early scenes showing the profound humiliation of people whose identities are literally effaced from the record. In later reels, director Spassov wastes way too much footage on silly scenes in the psychiatric institution, plus some discordantly light sequences near the end.

Still, performances are faultless. Yordanov, previously seen to advantage in "Emigrants," here shows great sensitivity as the hesitant young soldier whose deep humanity leaves him unshielded from the horrors he's forced to perpetrate. Similarly, Kazakova is both touching and fierce as the defiant woman determined to keep her name and traditions. Better known as a d.p., helmer Spassov shows an eye for artistic compositions, and lensing by Plamen Somov is always attractive.

Camera (color), Plamen Somov; editors, Boyka Popova, Evgenya Tasseva; music, Bozhidar Petkov; production designer, Georgi Todorov; costume designer, Boryana Semerdjieva. Reviewed at Sofia Film Festival (Balkan Screenings), March 11, 2005. Running time: 107 MIN.

Review | Egg by Derek Elley

Egg (Turkey-Greece)By DEREK ELLEY

A Kaplan Film (Turkey)/Inkas Film (Greece) production. (International sales: Coach 14, Paris.) Produced by Semih Kaplanoglu, Lilette Botassi. Directed by Semih Kaplanoglu. Screenplay, Kaplanoglu, Orcun Koksal.

With: Nejat Isler, Saadet Isil Aksoy, Ufuk Bayraktar, Tulin Ozen, Gulcin Santircioglu, Kaan Karabacak, Semra Kaplanoglu.

After his Nuri Bilge Ceylan Lite exercise, "Angel's Fall," Turkish writer-helmer Semih Kaplanoglu retreats into a far less elegaic universe with third feature "Egg." Faux metaphysical snoozeroo, centered on a poet returning to his village after his mother's death, is pure fest fare for the long-take, minimalist crowd.

Reaching his family home, Yusuf (Nejat Isler) meets his brother's granddaughter, Ayla (Saadet Isil Aksoy), who'd looked after his mom, Zehra (Semra Kaplanoglu). Ayla asks Yusuf to perform the sacrifice of a ram his mom had never been able to, so at the hour mark, the pair set off in his jalopy, overnighting at a hotel where a wedding reception is taking place. On the way back, Yusuf asks Ayla why his mother wanted the sacrifice. "I don't know," she replies. That night, Yusuf is prevented from leaving the village by a huge, slobbering, ornery mutt. Technically O.K. pic is the first in a trilogy, "Honey, Milk and Egg," which the helmer is (natch) presenting in reverse order. "For me, filmmaking is an entirely metaphysical and philosophical endeavor," writes Kaplanoglu in the pic's press notes. Some content would be nice, too.

Camera (Fujicolor), Ozgur Eken; editor, Ayhan Ergursel, Kaplanoglu, Suzan Hande Guneri; art director, Naz Erayda. Reviewed at Cannes Film Festival (Directors' Fortnight), May 22, 2007. Original Turkish title: Yumurta. Turkish dialogue. Running time: 98 MIN.

Times and Winds | Bes Vakit by Reha Erdem

Times and Winds | Bes Vakit | Turkey, 2006, 110 min, 35mm
In Turkish with English subtitles

Directed By: Reha ErdemPROD: Ömer Atay
SCR/ED: Reha Erdem
CAM: Florent Henry
Cast: Özkan Özen, Ali Bey Kayali, Elit Iscan, Bülent Emin Yarar, Taner Birsel
This magical film is a haunting portrait of the tensions that lie beneath the seemingly placid surface of a remote, beautiful and rugged mountain village perched between sea and sky, untouched by the modern world. The director's fourth feature recounts the dreams and desires of villagers whose simple lives are regulated by the calls to prayer that divide the day (and the film) into five sections (the Turkish title literally translates as "five times"). The main characters are three youngsters, two boys and a girl living in this harsh, strictly disciplined culture, where both animals and children are frequently beaten. In subtle touches, the picture deals with the early sexual awakening of the three, their communion with nature and revolt against their parents. Omar, the imam's son, fantasizes about killing his father. He collects scorpions, hoping they will do the job for him. Omar's best friend Yakup has fallen in love with the beautiful schoolteacher and turns against his own father when he discovers that his dad is a Peeping Tom who has been spying on the young woman Yakup worships. The girl, Yildiz, is obliged to mother her baby brother, while her budding sexuality is troubled after she witnesses her parents making love. Erdem's lyrical and meditative film is visually stunning, shot by his talented regular director of photography Florent Henry and with an extraordinary score by Arvo Pärt. Times and Winds walked off with the two main prizes at the 25th Istanbul International Film Festival--Best Turkish Film and FIPRESCI awards.”--Elliot Stein, Tribeca Film Festival

With a remarkable attention to the vicissitudes of life in a remote Turkish village; director Reha Erdem captures the delicate transition between childhood and adulthood, as three young friends explore the fraught territory of love, lust and death. A humanist-pastoral epic in the tradition of Pudovkin.--LA Weekly

Print Source |Film Contact
Claudine Avetyan
Atlantik Film
Ust Zerren sokak no:2
1. Levent 34330,
Phone: (90.212) 278.3611
Fax: (90.212) 278.1971
Email: claudine@atlantikfilm.com
Web Site: www.atlantikfilm.com

Review | The Edge of Heaven by Derek Elley

The Edge of Heaven
Auf der anderen seite
[EDGEO] Special Presentations

Germany , Turkey, 2007, 122 min, 35mm
In Turkish, German with English subtitles

Directed By: Fatih Akin
PRODS: Andreas Thiel, Klaus Maeck, Fatih Akin
SCR: Fatih Akin
CAM: Rainer Klausmann
ED: Andrew Bird
MUS: Shantel
Cast: Nurgül Yesilçay, Baki Davrak, Patrycia Ziolkowska, Nursel Köse, Hanna Schygulla
There may be no more exciting filmmaker working today than Turkish-German filmmaker Fatih Akin. Winner of the best screenplay award at Cannes earlier this year, this superbly cast drama limns the emotional arcs of six people--four Turks and two Germans--as they crisscross. In Germany, retired widower Ali seeks a solution to his loneliness in the arms of a prostitute, Yeter, who's also a Turkish national. Meanwhile, Yeter's daughter, a political activist on the run, has come to Germany to find her mother. Alone and penniless, she's befriended by Lotte, who invites her into her home, despite the disapproval of her own mother. What happens to these four lives can only be summed up with one word: tragedy.

Akin sets up these characters, and their interrelations, and watches the chips fall as they may. It adds up to a tumultuous and heartbreaking illustration of the looseness of the ties that bind, and just how fast they can unravel before our very eyes. If you liked Babel, you will love The Edge of Heaven.

"The point at which a good director crosses the career bridge to become an international talent is vividly clear in The Edge of Heaven, an utterly assured, profoundly moving fifth feature by Fatih Akin... [The film] takes the German-born Turkish writer-director's ongoing interest in two seemingly divergent cultures to a humanist level that's way beyond the grungy romanticism of his 2003 Head On or the dreamy dramedy of In July (2000)..."--Derek Elley, Variety

Bliss | Mutluluk by Abdullah Oguz 2007

Bliss |Mutluluk Greece , Turkey, 2007, 105 min, 35mm
Directed By: Abdullah Oguz
PROD/SCR: Abdullah Oguz
CAM: Mirsad Herovic
EDS: Levent Celebi-LewQ, Abdullah Oguz
MUS: Zülfü Livaneli
Cast: Talat Bulut, Özgü Namal, Murat Han, Mustafa Avkiran, Emin Gursoy
When a young woman named Meryem (Özgü Namal) is raped, her village custom requires that she be killed in order for the dishonour to be expunged from her family. A young man named Cemal (Murat Han), the son of the village leader, is given the task but at the last moment he has doubts. The pair go on the run, followed close behind by local thugs intent on killing the girl. Luckily enough, Cemal and Meryem meet up with a charismatic man named Irfan, an ex-university professor who is embarking on a sailing trip, and needs a crew. Seems Irfan is running away too--in his case from a dead marriage and an empty life. Together this unlikely trio set forth on a voyage that will change all of their lives.

Adapted from Zülfü Livaneli's international best-selling novel, director Abdullah Oguz's drama is filled with intensity, vivid cultural clash, fine music and some absolutely stunning scenery (the film was shot on the Sea of Marmara). But ultimately it is the figure of Meryem, a young woman struggling to live in a culture that condones the practice of female honour killings, that gives the film its heart. Meryem's decision to live, and ultimately, to enjoy her life is the quiet revolution that ignites the entire story.

Abdullah Oguz Filmography:
The Ivy Mansion--Life (2003),
Jailbirds (2005)"
Bliss(2007)
Mutluluk

Print Source | Hakan Karademir
ANS Productions
Tesvikiye Vaddesi Tesvikiye Palas Apt 107/6
Tesvikiye
Istanbul, 34365
Phone: (90212) 259-7785
Fax: (90212) 227.5637
Email: mutluluk.ans@gmail.com Web Site: www.mutlulukfilm.com

Sales Contact
Federica Mei
Intramovies
Via Eustachio Manfredi, 15
00197 Rome,
Phone: (39.06) 807 6157
Fax: (39.06) 807 6156
Email: f.mei@intramovies.com
Web Site: www.intramovies.com

Vancouver IFF | Turkish Films

The 26th annual Vancouver International Film Festival will be held September 27 - October 12, 2007. Three Turkish Films are in the programme. VIFF was founded in 1982.

Alan Franey:Festival Director |PoChu AuYeung |Program Manager


Bliss | Mutluluk by Abdullah Oguz

Times and Winds | Bes Vakit by Reha Erdem

The Edge of Heaven by Fatih Akin

Print Source |Film Contact (Canadian Dist.)
Tom Alexander
Mongrel Media
1028 Queen Street West
Toronto, ON M6J 1H6
Phone: (416) 516 9775 x227
Fax: (416) 516 0651
Email: tom@mongrelmedia.com
Web Site: www.mongrelmedia.com

Akın's ‘Edge of Heaven' to run for foreign Oscar

Akın's ‘Edge of Heaven' to run for foreign Oscar
Turkish-born German filmmaker Fatih Akın's latest feature "Auf Der Anderen Seite" (The Edge of Heaven) was named as the German entry to compete for the best foreign language film award in next year's Oscars.

The German film body, which selected the film to represent Germany at the 80th edition of the Academy Awards in February, announced its decision on Tuesday. A nine-member independent jury of film experts at German Films, the national information and advisory center for the promotion of German cinema worldwide, chose "The Edge of Heaven" from among seven productions.

Akın said he was extremely pleased to be selected to represent Germany in the Oscars. "The Edge of Heaven," starring Nurgül Yeşilçay, Baki Davrak, Tuncel Kurtiz and Hanna Schygulla in its leading roles, centers on a generation of immigrants caught between two cultures in Turkey and Germany. "The Edge of Heaven" brought the young filmmaker the best screenplay award earlier this year at the prestigious Cannes Film Festival, where it also had its world premiere.

The film, which also won the Ecumenical Jury Award in Cannes, is the second installment in Akın's of trilogy about love, death and evil. His 2004 Golden Bear winner "Head On" was the first installment, portraying love, and "The Edge of Heaven" shows death. Akın has yet to make the third installment, which will illustrate evil. "The Edge of Heaven" will have its Turkey debut on Oct. 26. The 80th edition of the Academy Awards is scheduled to take place Feb. 24, 2008.

Turkish business bounces back

Turkish business bounces back
Government funding boosts film industry
By ANNA FRANKLIN \ VARIETY

Two years after the Turkish Ministry of Culture announced it would begin to provide serious funding for the Turkish film industry, the results are evident, with nearly 40 feature films produced over the past year and 34 released, capturing 51.7 % of the total Turkish box office.

This is a huge increase over the usual annual production of 20 or so films five years ago, of which half would be lucky to be released. The numbers have been steadily growing, with 27 Turkish films released in 2005 and 17 released in 2004.

While the 17 million Turkish Lira ($12.5 million) invested annually by the Ministry of Culture may not be much by international standards, it's an important boost for Turkish films, where budgets average between $500,000 and $1 million.

The production of quality art films like Semih Kaplanoglu's "Egg," a Turkish-Greek co-production, is rising as a result of this funding.

"Egg," which also received Eurimage support, is part of a trilogy being shot by Kaplanoglu. "Milk" and "Honey" are still to come, with "Milk," which has also received backing from the World Cinema Fund in Berlin, due to start shooting in autumn."The budget for 'Egg' was very low, about $500,000, so the funding from the Ministry of Culture and Eurimage was very important," said Kaplanoglu at the Istanbul Film Festival. "I work with only one professional actor. I guess the technique is similar to Nuri Bilge Ceylan, who works with non-professionals. Nuri opened doors for Turkish film throughout the world. Now festival selectors really look at our films."

Ceylan's "Climates" won the prize for best Turkish film at this year's Istanbul Film Fest as well as a competition slot in Cannes last year. Ceylan was one of the first to receive funding under the new government initiative that stipulates films that win international prizes or slots in A-class international film festivals do not have to pay back their grant money.

While art films are bringing kudos internationally for Turkey, the local box office continues to be dominated by commercially successful local productions.

Commercial projects can also receive Ministry of Culture support in the form of loans that must be repaid out of box office receipts, but producers like BMK, which scored a hit with Cem Yilmaz vehicle "The Magician," opt to finance projects themselves.

The top four films for 2006 were all Turkish, following a trend that began five years ago. Topping the 2006 box office was the anti-Iraq war "Valley of the Wolves," directed by Sedar Akar and Sadullah Senturk, with $20 million; followed by "The Class of Chaos," directed by Ferdi Egilmez, with $9.4 million and distributed by Ozen Film; Yilmaz's "The Magician," with $9.3 million, and a new comedy, "The Exam," by Omer Faruk Sorak who directed the hit "G.O.R.A.," with $5.7 million.