Thursday 3th of June:‘Beynelmilel’ in English“The International” [Turkey, 2006]

"The International" Directed by Muharrem Gulmez and Sirri Sureyya Onder, Written by Sirri Sureyaa Onder (Screenplay)

The movie is one of the example of a genre recently began to be seen more and more in Turkish cinema telling the traumatic events of 12 september 1980 military coup, in a tragi-comic way.
The story takes place in a small town in Turkey in 1982, under the influence of the oppressive regime of the coup, where the local military head made a local musical band, a gevende, to play for the arrival of their chief.
The band supposed to prepare a repertoire of military, nationalist marches for the performance at the event day which will give them the permission to open a pavilion (a low key pub-club thing). The events begin to unfold along this axis.

The genre that Beynelmilel fits into is, another BKM (a film production company) production, that isssues the coup d'etat that has not been shown, talked, represented till recently. The genre has been criticisized heavily by some, of being too reductionist and caricaturising the traumatic events of the time and appreciated by others as an attempt to make those times accessible to younger generations.
This session is hosted by Esra Oslay.

27th of May: "Dekalog" (1989)

This is a series of ten shorts created for Polish Television, with plots loosely based upon the Ten Commandments, directed by Krzysztof Kieslowski. Two of these, Dekalog 5 and 6, are shorter cuts from the feature-length films--Krotki film o zabijaniu (A Short Film About Killing) and Krotki film o milosci (A Short Film About Love), respectively. They deal with the emotional turmoil suffered by humanity, when instinctual acts and societal morality conflict. Written by Tad Dibbern
This week we are going to watch two episodes of these series.

20th of May: "Son of the Bride" (Spanish: El hijo de la novia) (2001)

The film tells of Rafael Belvedere (Ricardo Darín), a 42-year-old divorced restaurateur, with a young daughter named Vicki (Gimena Nóbile) he has joint custody of. Rafael lives a very hectic lifestyle.

His mother Norma (Norma Aleandro) suffers from Alzheimer's disease and he has not seen her in a year. Rafael sees his father Nino (Héctor Alterio) frequently but his friends rarely. He's fielding offers to sell the restaurant he runs in Buenos Aires, but changes his mind because it was started by his mother and father and has been in the family for years.
His childhood friend Juan Carlos (Eduardo Blanco), who he has not seen for twenty years, drops by the restaurant and renews their old friendship, demonstrating the fact that he has become an actor.
One day, Rafael suddenly suffers a heart attack and, as he recovers in the intensive care unit, he is forced to reevaluate his life and decide his priorities. He now wants to sell the restaurant and move to southern Mexico and raise horses. At the same time his father wants to remarry his wife because they were never married in the Catholic Church. Rafael is opposed to the renewal of vows because his ailing mother will not be much of a participant.
As part of his new life, he tells his much-younger girlfriend Nati that he wants some space and some freedom. At first she is hurt and tells him that he is no Albert Einstein, Bill Gates, or even Dick Watson. (Rafael is puzzled about the identity of Dick Watson and we find out at the middle of the end credits that it refers to a character in a porno film.) Although Rafael tries to get her to understand his perspective, she ultimately breaks off their relationship. Rafael tries to deal with his struggles with this relationships and the fact that the Church is unsupportive, and ends up selling the restaurant and having Juan Carlos act the role of a priest at his parents' second wedding.

The film ends after the wedding, with Rafael opening a new restaurant and apologizing to Nati; she joyously forgives him and there are strong hints that their relationship will revive.

13th of May: Delta [Hungary, 2008]

A quiet young man returns to the wild, isolated landscape of the Delta. It is a labyrinth of waterways, small islands and over-grown vegetation, where the villagers are cut off from the outside world. The young man, who has been away since early childhood, is introduced to a sister he never knew he had. She is frail and timid, but resolute when she decides to join him in his run-down hut on the shore. They eventually become lovers, with rejection by the family and ridicule from the coarse villagers leading to tragedy.

Together they build a house on stilts in the middle of the river, far away from everyone else. One day, they invite the villagers over to share a meal together, but it becomes apparent that the coarse locals do not accept their “unnatural” relationship.