Saturday, September 17, 2011

Bir zamanlar Anadolu'da / Once Upon a Time in Anatolia

TK/BA 2011. PC: Zeyno Film. P: Zeynep Özbatur. D: Nuri Bilge Ceylan. SC: Ebru Ceylan, Nuri Bilge Ceylan, Ercan Kesal. DP: Gökhan Tiryaki - camera: Sony F35 - HDCAM - 2,35:1. PD: Dilek Yapkuöz Ayaztuna. S: Erkan Altinok. ED: Bora Göksingöl, Nuri Bilge Ceylan. Loc: Keskin (a district of the Kırıkkale Province in Central Anatolia). Cast: Muhammet Uzuner (doctor Cemal), Yilmaz Erdoğan (commissar Naci), Taner Birsel (prosecutor Nusret), Ahmet Mumtaz Taylan (driver Arab Ali), Firat Tanis (suspect Kenan), Ercan Kesal (Mukhtar). 157 min. A Zeyno Film print with English subtitles viewed at Bio Rex (Helsinki International Film Festival), 17 Sep 2011.

From the programme catalogue: "In a search that will last all night long, two men are being driven around a remote rural area in two police cars and an army jeep. The squinting, silent Kenan has confessed to murdering Yasar and burying him, apparently with the help of the other man. Now the police chief Naci has called prosecutor Nusret all the way from Ankara to witness the discovery of the corpse. Everything must be done properly, dictated in bureaucratic lingo, and drafted into a report."

The feeling of the vast, arid landscape drives this slow account of a murder investigation based on a true story. This is a film that has a sense of duration. The scenes play out in almost real time. Nuri Bilge Ceylan has an original eye for landscape, light and composition. There is an obvious digital look in the movie.

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