A Árvore dos Frutos Selvagens

Nuri Bilge Ceylan is arguably the best director Turkey has ever seen and Ahlat Agaci is definitely one of the best films in recent years that has been made by Turkish directors.

The plot, the acting and the cinematography is simply incredible. As a guy who lives in Turkey, it's very rare to see films with a quality. So in that way, I can easily say that Ahlat Agaci is the best movie in the past 4-5 years.

What stood out for me in the film was that you basically never get bored even though the film is quite long. No unnecessary scenes, no characters that you hate everytime you see them. Definitely a thing to consider.

NBC is so undervalued and underrated, at least in his homecountry. Interestingly enough, European cinema appreciates him and he almost always participates in Cannes Film Festival, but I'm %100 sure that half of Turkey doesn't even know his name. It's sad, but it also says a lot about the general look to cinema sector in Turkey.

Thanks to people like NBC, though, we can watch 'real' and 'non-American made' films.

Quality film by an incredible director. 10/10

It has been 21 years since Ceylan shot his first feature film Kasaba, whose main theme was an intellectual young man's desperate, family-stuck life in the countryside with no way out. After this film throughout his film career he focused on different themes as well of course, from middle class criticism (Climates) to film noir (Three Monkeys). But, being from Turkey, eventually in his last movies he returned to the countryside tales again. Especially this movie, The Wild Pear Tree, seemed to me as if Ceylan suffered from a partial amnesia and forgot that he shot the movie Kasaba. So he blended this "brand new film idea" with his recently developed film aesthetics and here we have The Wild Pear Tree.

In his first movies Ceylan barely had a story, he only had "themes". The rest of the movie was wonderful photography and this is what he got famous for. Then, founding clever collaborations, he learnt how to tell stories as well. But the question here is: does he really have a new story to tell? Turkey has changed a lot since Kasaba, but Ceylan's representations look like they are here to stay eternally. For instance, while Ceylan still hold on to the "intellectual stuck in the countryside" stereotype, intellectuals in the Turkish countryside either made it to the metropolises or they are replaced/outdated by the emerging religious elite.

So instead of telling a new story, Ceylan seems like he chose to "garnish" what he already has, with neverending dialogues unattached to each other. Dialogue with the girl, dialogue with the mayor, with the businessman, with the writer, with the police friend, with the imams and with this and this and this. Kind of a video game, one "countryside monster" at a time. So I think this movie is a rococo remake of minimalist Kasaba.

So if you tolerate the theatrical lines in the first dialogues, the movie is a nice one to see. But in comparison to the last 2 movies of Ceylan, this is certainly a step backwards (and surprisingly, this backwardness is evident also in the photography).

The main character has a very rich and interesting personality, as well as the other characters that surround him. The cinematography is amazing as usual but some of the weird things that happen during the moving shots make them far less impressive than the glorious still shots.

It's very easy to find things from your own life within the story and the dialogues that occur which makes a lot of the little-longer-than-usual scenes very engaging and that makes you wonder how the dialogue is gonna develop and conclude.

I normally don't care too much about the length of movies but I'm a little bit on the negative side with this one. That's mainly because of what I told myself halfway through the movie which was; "Ohhh, we're only halfway" instead of "Yeahhh, we're only halfway".

It's about a young writer who recently finished university. He must move back to his village from the city where he went to school. So his struggles start as he doesn't want to get used to the village life.

Is it possible to feel the same things with somebody struggling to build his own life, the difficulties he faces to be free from his parents' expectations or oppressions, to realize that they are not his supporters but his obstacles?.maybe a part of it, yes the duration of the film may be longer than the standards (who determines them?) at the end i felt that every scene was necessary to get closer to Sinan's feelings. Asuman who watches a Yilmaz Guney's film, the mother slapping his son's face scene in that film, maybe inspired her to make "why you didn't get the money from him" conversation with her own son or the imams and Sinan's debate about faith, the famous writer's and Sinan dialogue then conflict..even the scene about the tight budget of the lottery salesman maybe reminded Sinan his father's situation. I feel very lucky to watch this film in its original language and I'm still digesting it but as soon as the film ended, i felt like Idris, Asuman, Sinan and all other people around him are still living there, in that town Çan!

The wind rises as Sinan and Hatice kiss at a spring on the outskirts of the forest. It is the threshold of many things, not merely the forest. A few steps in the right direction will lead to love and the fulfillment of dreams. The wrong steps invite heartbreak and the crushing weight of societal expectations. Which way to go?! While Sinan inspires Hatice to let her hair down, a big step in Turkey, he can't seem to help himself. The gambling addiction, fawning desire to please and wild schemes of his father are not where Sinan wants to go, yet understanding his father is the key to understanding himself, for better or worse. Wild pears are isolated misfits, and so are father and son.

This witty and beautiful film is full of metaphors, wonderful imagery and deep, intriguing conversations. The film revolves around many interesting themes. Among these themes is that ruptures in the soul should be treated with joy and patience for they help us discover who we are. The cinematography is luminous, mesmerizing and far ranging from lamp lit streets at night, rainfall and close-ups of Hatice's flowing hair. I want to linger in each place. It is a long film, but for what it reveals about contemporary Turkish society and human nature, it is a fantastic bargain and worth the price. From the director of Winter Sleep and Once Upon a Time in Anatolia. Seen at the 2018 Toronto International Film Festival.