A good year in Turkish cinema, but for who?

Turkish movies have been winning awards at major international film festivals from Berlin and Montreal to Sarajevo and Dubai throughout the year. Box Office numbers show that seven out of the 10 top-grossing movies are Turkish. However, the fact is that none of the movies that brought crowds to theaters are award-winners

It’s been both a record year and a bizarre year for Turkish cinema. In September, an unknown Turkish name won the Lion of the Future award at the Venice International Film Festival. Director and writer Ali Aydın made many proud with Küf (Mold), his debut feature and a poetic look at a father’s loss.

Then there were the award-sweepers like Emin Alper’s Tepenin Ardı (Beyond the Hill) and Reis Çelik’s Lal Gece (Night of Silence), hitting the news with new awards at international film festivals all through the year. Another happy piece of news for Turkish cinephiles came two weeks ago when Turkish auteur Zeki Demirkubuz’s Yeraltı (Inside) won the Best Film and Best Actor awards in the Dubai International Film Festival.

Box Office Turkey’s numbers for 2012 is another success story for Turkish cinema, setting yet another record with seven out of 10 movies among the most-watched films being Turkish films. These all seem consistent at first glance, serving as testament to a wonderful year for Turkish cinema. While it was truly a wonderful year for Turkish cinema, at home at the box office and abroad in international film circles, there is still a catch.

None of the seven films that drew crowds to movie theaters in 2012 are the above award winners or others that wowed the audience from Tokyo and Sarajevo to Abu Dhabi and Montreal. The top three most-watched movies, according to Box Office Turkey, have attracted more than 10 million viewers, one out of seven people in Turkey.

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Turkish cinema asks: Which human rights?

Celebrating global Human Rights Day, here is a look at human rights violations in recent history with a brief journey through Turkish cinema. Hunger strikes, political prisoners, war in southeastern Turkey and disappearances in custody are some of the subjects of these films

Today is Human Rights Day across the globe, the day we celebrate the proclamation and adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. For many in Turkey there isn’t all that much to celebrate these days considering the hunger strikes, imprisoned journalists, disappearances in custody and a growing perception that the rule of law is no longer the norm.

Perhaps the best way to take a look at human rights in Turkey - or rather the violation of human rights - is to remember some of the feature films and documentaries that have brought some of these violations into the spotlight in recent memory.

The obvious first choice is journalist Ruhi Karadağ’s documentary Simurg (Simurgh), currently on release in theaters. The film focuses on hunger strikes, an issue that recently made the news, although the recent hunger strikes were different to the ones shown in the movie. What’s more, the recent ones did not end up with an infamous operation in which police and soldiers broke into prisons to halt the strikes.

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Turkish films shine in Venice line-up

Absent at the Venice International Film Fest for two decades, Turkish cinema has become a regular fixture in the festival over the last four years. This year’s line up includes three movies from Turkish filmmakers Here’s a look at the journey of Turkish cinema in Venice over the past four years

With less than a month before the 69th Venice International Film Festival kicks off, the line-up has been announced, surprising moviegoers with only a few of the expected overlaps with the Toronto Film Festival. The festival will open with The Reluctant Fundamentalist by Mira Nair, one of the 20 female directors who are going to be debuting their work this year.

The list of films to be screened at the festival came as good news for Turkey, with internationally-acclaimed female director Yeşim Ustaoğlu’s Araf (Somewhere in Between) included into the Orrizonti (Horizons) section, and director Ali Aydın’s debut feature Küf (Mold) competing for the Lion of the Future award, an award won two years ago by another Turkish director’s debut feature, Seren Yüce’s Çoğunluk (Majority).

The inclusion of the two films in the line-up made headlines last weekend, but there was another success story by two other Turkish filmmakers. One of the films to be screened in the Giornate degli Autori (Venice Days) section of the festival is Inheritance, a joint production between Israel, France and Turkey. The film is the directorial debut of Palestinian actress Hiam Abbass, renowned for her roles in such films as Satin Rouge, Dawn of the World, and Amreeka. The two Turkish names from among the producers are Faruk Özerten and Ender Sevim. Özerten has channeled his skills to producing after having worked in the U.S. as an assistant director and a producer for one of the episodes of the short-lived TV series Missing, starring Ashley Judd.

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KÜF Project brings subversive street art to Ankara

A urinal over the ugly tiles of one of Ankara's underpasses, 'No Parking' signs turned into peace signs, sidewalk barriers transformed into Pac-Man's 'pac-dots' - all are the work of Ankara's street art collective, the KÜF Project. The Hürriyet Daily News talks to members of the movement that makes Turkey's capital city a little more colorful each day

There were more smiles than usual in Ankara when the round sidewalk barriers on Cinnah Street, one of the capital’s main roads, turned into yellow “pac-dots” from the Pac-Man video game. Cut outs of Pac-Man and his nemesis Blinky face off over a line of dots that Pac-Man surely would like to gobble right up.

The guerilla installation was the work of Ankara’s collective street art movement, the KÜF Project, which has also turned “No Parking” signs into peace signs and “No Entry” street signs into the jerseys of the Turkish national football team, replicating the 4-4-2 formation of the team in the match against Bosnia in 2009, which led Turkey to be disqualified from the World Cup.

The idea, the group says in its manifesto, is “not to pollute the streets,” but “to color them with dormant energy.”

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