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 9
Turkey
2002 / 90m / English subtitles / Cert. 15
Director: Ümit Ünal
Cast: Ali Poyrazoglu, Cezmi Baskin, Serra Yilmaz, Fikret Kuskan,
Ozan Güven, Rafa Radomisli
A young,
homeless girl is found brutally murdered in a poor neighbourhood
in Istanbul. Nobody knows where she came from. A police investigation
is mounted, and six people are interrogated. As the investigation
progresses, the suspects find themselves being manipulated
and abused, and ultimately reveal the secret history of their
neighbourhood. This feature film debut by director Ümit
Ünal is Turkey's first film to be shot on DV and transferred
to 35mm.
(Selected
as Turkey's official entry to the 2003 Oscars.)
 CONFESSION
(Itiraf)
Turkey
2001 / 90m / English subtitles / Cert. 15
Director: Zeki Demirkubuz
Cast: Taner Birsel, Basak Köklükaya, Miraç
Eronat, Iskender Altin
The second
film in Zeki Demirkubuz's
Tales About Darkness trilogy, has Harun, a rich and
successful businessman, returning home to Ankara from a business
trip to discover that his wife, Nilgün, has been unfaithful.
She is unaware that he knows, and he decides not to believe
in the truth and risk losing his beautiful wife. However,
with the passing of time, he finds that he needs to uncover
the truth. When, one night he finally decides to challenge
her face-to-face, the "truth" he discovers is not
the one he has been expecting.
 ELEPHANTS
AND GRASS (Filler ve Çimen)
Turkey
2001 / 115m / English subtitles / Cert. 15
Director: Dervis Zaim
Cast: Bülent Kayabas, Ali Sürmeli, Sanmen Çelik,
Ugur polat, Haluk Bilginer, Taner Barlas
ELEPHANTS
AND GRASS is a film filled with disparate characters whose
stories at first appear to be independent of each other, but
slowly, as the film progresses, we learn of their increasing
similarities. As the stories begin to overlap and intertwine
with one another, a number of plot twists are revealed. The
different characters that populate the film include Mafia
godfathers, politicians, bureaucrats, assassins, policemen
and an athlete who is trying to raise money to pay for medical
treatment for his brother. ELEPHANTS AND GRASS is a fascinating,
revealing and enthralling portrait of Turkey during the last
15 years.
 FATE
(Yazgi)
Turkey
2001 / 120m / English subtitles / Cert. 15
Director: Zeki Demirkubuz
Cast: Serdar Orçin, Zeynep Tokus, Engin Günaydin
The first
film in Zeki Demirkubuz's Tales About Darkness trilogy,
FATE is the story of customs office worker Musa's determination,
taken to extreme lengths, that nothing will affect the equilibrium
of his life, not even the death of his own mother. In order
to not make the decision himself, he marries a girl he doesn't
love, just because his mother wanted him to get married. Inspired
by Albert Camus' famous novel The Stranger, FATE is an intriguing
portrait of a man who feels guilty without any reason, and
who neglects to use his will.
 HEJAR
(Büyük Adam Küçük Ask)
Turkey
- Greece - Hungary 2001 / 120m / English subtitles / Cert.
PG
Director: Handan Ipekçi
Cast: Sükran Güngör, Dilan Erçetin,
Füsun Demirel, Yildiz Kenter
Mr Rifat
is a 75-year-old retired judge. When the police raid the apartment
next door killing the occupants in an exchange of gunfire,
a young girl, Hejar, miraculously escapes and is given refuge
by Mr Rifat's housekeeper, Sakine. When Rifat notices that
Hejar is injured and in shock, he decides not to contact the
authorities but to help her. However, things do not go according
to plan, as it becomes apparent that Hejar is Kurdish and
does not speak any Turkish. At first their relationship is
antagonistic, but slowly a bond begins to form between them,
and they gradually develop a touching friendship with each
other.
 INNOWHERELAND
(Hiçbiryerde)
Turkey
2001 / 90m / English subtitles / Cert. 15
Director: Tayfun Pirselimoglu
Cast: Zuhal Olcay, Parkan Özturan, Meral Okay, Rubi Sari,
Cezmi Baskin, Devin Özgür Çinar
After
the death of her Kurdish husband, a political activist, Sükran
insisted on raising her son, Veysel, as apolitical and "clean".
Then, one day, he disappears. Still believing that her son
is alive, she goes to the police for help, but with no success.
Then, one day a friend approaches her with information that
a young man called Veysel has escaped from police custody
while being transported, and was last seen in Mardin, a small
town in south-east Turkey. Sükran immediately decides
to go to Mardin in search of her estranged son.
 MIRROR
(Ayna)
Turkey
- Canada 2002 / 80m / English subtitles / Cert. 15
Director: Hakan Sahin
Cast: Ugur Polat, Ljubo Bakic, Travis Vanhill, Cengiz Temelli,
Catherine Mazer, Lambert Weffen
A man
who is tormented by the memory of the accidental drowning
of his brother journeys to Canada to study, and escape. He
takes a job at a grocery store in a small town to finance
his studies. There, he finds a fresh and eccentric culture,
but as time passes he becomes more isolated. He becomes increasingly
indisciplined, erratic and irritable. Then an unexpected confrontation
with death finally gives him what he has been searching for
all along - the affirmation of life.
 THE
RUNAWAY MUMMY (Mumya Firarda)
Turkey
2002 / 110m / English subtitles / Cert. 15
Director: Erdal Murat Aktas
Cast: Teoman, Nurgül Yesilcay, Selami Sahin, Nurseli
Idiz
A big
box office hit in Turkey, this is an energetic and charming
Hollywood-style caper comedy with a crazy plot set in Egypt
and Turkey. On the day when the beautiful half-Egyptian and
half-Turkish Fatima and the young Turkish secret agent Ahmet
meet each other at the airport, there are two coffins on the
plane arriving from Egypt. Then, by mistake, the stolen mummified
Ramses IV is sent to Yaha's mourning family and poor kidnapped
archaeologist Yayha to a passionate gangster, who hopes to
cure his sexual problems by using the mummy as an aphrodisiac.
 THE
WATERFALL (Sellale)
Turkey
2001 / 120m / English subtitles / Cert. 15
Director: Semir Aslanyürek
Cast: Hülya Koçyigit, Tuncel Kurtiz, Aykut Oray,
Ali Sürmeli, Enis Aslanyürek May 1960.
Harbiye,
a hill suburb south of Antakya in south-east Turkey, just
before the military intervention of 27 May. A young boy, Cemal
(Aslanyürek) lives with his father Yusuf (Oray), a staunch
democrat and anti-communist. Next door to them is Cemal's
uncle, Suleyman (Sürmeli), who is the political opposite
of Cemal's father. The two men have constructed a wall between
them, and haven't spoken to each other for years. When the
local waterfall, a place where women traditionally go to to
recount their dreams, is demolished to make way for the construction
of a factory, things come to a head between the town's differing
political factions, and, ultimately, for Cemal's family life.
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