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At night, Fehmi (Oktay Cubuk) is rummaging though his father’s and brother’s belongings in search for money. Like many youngsters from his neighborhood, he’s hooked on bonsai, a dangerous type of synthetic cannabinoid deadly drug used by 1/3 of 1,5 million Turkish addicts. As graffiti sprayed on a wall close to Fehmi’s house explains – “There are no airports in our hood, but everyone is flying high”.

“When I’m Done Dying” is screening at Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival

Fehmi could literally fly high if he had the strength to kick his habit. He is lucky in love and his rap band “Hakikat” was noticed by a big producer who’s interested in recording their first album. But Fehmi’s flying only in one direction – downwards, spiraling with great speed towards the hard concrete of Istanbul.

Nisan Dag’s sophomore long feature film “When I’m Done Dying...

In a small village in the mountains of northeastern Turkey, three peasant sisters uneasily reunite under their father’s rustic roof in Emin Alper’s opaque, oddly theatrical “A Tale of Three Sisters.” Stunningly lensed in widescreen amidst the rocky peaks, the film struggles to excite admiration outside the visuals, forcing the viewer to vainly search for what exactly it was Alper wished to achieve. Bearing no evident connection to Chekhov’s “Three Sisters” apart perhaps from the girls’ desire, like Irina Sergeyevna, to live in town, this ultimately uninteresting drama is undermined by characters of little discernible intelligence whose plight will leave many viewers apathetic, partly due to the way dialogue seems to be artificially recited rather than naturally delivered. Outside a few festivals and Turkish showcases, it’s hard to imagine who’ll buy this “Tale.”

Unlike Alper’s previous feature “Frenzy,” with its clear parallels to the political situation today,...

A Tale of Three Sisters

Turkish director Emin Alper returns with his third feature, A Tale of Three Sisters, a 1980s set period piece. Produced by Nadir Operli (who also produced Alper’s sophomore film Frenzy in 2015 as well as the Jessica Woodsworth and Peter Brosens title The King of the Belgians), the feature stars Kayhan Açikgöz, Cemre Ebuzziya, Helin Kandemir, Müfit Kayacan, and Ece Yüksel. Emre Erkmen lensed the feature. Alper’s 2012 debut Beyond the Hill won an award out of Berlin’s Forum sidebar. His 2015 sophomore film Frenzy competed in Venice and won a Special Jury Prize.…...

Nine titles announced for Berlinale, which runs Feb 7-17.

The first films have been announced for the 2019 Berlin International Film Festival Competition and Berlinale Special sections.

The Competition line-up includes new films by Fatih Akin (The Golden Glove), François Ozon (By the Grace of God) and Denis Côté (Ghost Town Anthology).

The other three films in the strand are Marie Kreutzer’s The Ground Beneath My Feet, Angela Schanelec’s I Was at Home, but and Emin Alper’s A Tale of Three Sisters. All are world premieres except By the Grace Of God which is an international premiere.

The...

The Berlin Film Festival has revealed the first wave of titles for its competition lineup, including new films from François Ozon, Marie Kreutzer, Denis Côté and Fatih Akin. Charles Ferguson’s Watergate documentary is among the Berlinale Special titles.

The first nine Competition and Berlinale Special films were revealed today, alongside the previously announced opening film, The Kindness of Strangers by Lone Scherfig.

Festival favourites Akin (In The Fade) and Ozon (In The House) return with German-language thriller The Golden Glove and French-language drama By The Grace Of God, respectively. The former follows a serial killer who strikes fear in the hearts of residents of Hamburg during the early 1970s. The latter looks at a real-life case of sexual abuses allegedly committed by a French priest in the late 1980s. Oscar-winner Ferguson (Inside Job) will present anticipated 260-minute feature doc Watergate, which is sure to draw plenty of contemporary parallels.