Once Upon A Time In Anatolia, New Turkish Cinema
”A metaphysical road movie about life, death and the limits of knowledge, “Once Upon a Time in Anatolia” has arrived just in time to cure the adult filmgoer blues. It was directed by the Turkish filmmaker Nuri Bilge Ceylan, whose earlier movies include “Distant” and “Three Monkeys” and who in recent years has emerged as one of the consistently most exciting directors on the international scene. His latest, which shared the grand prize at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival, takes the unassuming form of a police investigation that, as miles and words mount, evolves into a plangent, visually stunning meditation on what it is to be human.
The story is direct, if the journey less so. A man has been murdered, and a small battalion — a doctor, a prosecutor, a few policemen, several soldiers, diggers with shovels and a transcriber with a laptop — has invaded the countryside with the suspect to dig up the body. The trouble is that the accused, Kenan (Firat Tanis), claims to have been drunk when he committed the murder and can’t remember where he buried the body. And so off the men go in two cars and a Jeep, driving up and down the sensuous, rolling hills of Anatolia, the enormous peninsula that constitutes most of Turkey and which the ancient Greeks called the land of the rising sun”. (Manohla Dargis, The new York Times)
The Metropolis Association and the Izmir Cinema Association, in partnership with the Turkish Embassy in Lebanon, are glad to present the 2nd edition of the cycle New Turkish Cinema. 12 films of different genres will be screened at Metropolis Empire Sofil between the 5th and the 11th of March 2012, including a special selection of the reclaimed director Fatih Akin.
The festival will be opened with Nuri Bilge Ceylan’s film Once upon a time in Anatolia (winner of the Grand Jury Prize at Cannes Film Festival in 2011). The audience will also have the chance to see the latest film of Tyfun Piselimoglu Hair, as well as the favorites of the Turkish film festival such as What Remains by Cigdem Vitrinel, Zephyr by Belma Bas and Cosmos by Reha Erdem. In addition to this, the cycle will present the debut film of Seren Yuce Majority (winner of the Lion of the Future, Venice Film Festival 2010).
A special selection of the reclaimed director Fatih Akin will be selected: the romantic comedy In July (2000), the awarded Torino (2002), the reclaimed Head-On (winner of the Golden Bear, Berlin Film Festival 2004) and the documentary Crossing the Bridge: the Sound of Istanbul (2005).
Special Formula:Film duration: 150 minutes.
