Veda - Atatürk

Turkish renaissance man Zülfü Livaneli ("Shahmaran" & "Iron Earth, Copper Sky") draws upon the reminiscences of Atatürk's lifelong friend and loyal ADC Salih Bozok for this sumptuous but shallow hagiographic retelling of the life of the Grey Wolf intended to restore Turkish pride in the wake of the more controversial biopic "Mustafa" by Can Dündar.

With Atatürk on his deathbed a despondent Salih Bozok (Serhat Kılıç) begins to relate the life of the Grey Wolf from their childhood together on the streets of their beloved Thessalonica and on through their military career to the foundation of the republic and the President's tumultuous relationships with Fikriye (Özge Özpirinçci) and Latife (Ezgi Mola).

The talented and prodigious Sinan Tuzcu ("Orada" and "Nefes") takes up the bulk of the screen time as Atatürk between the ages of 25 to 45 but is given very little to work with as the character is two-dimensionally rendered with no apparent emotional depth even when the actor is interacting with his own wife Dolunay Soysert as the Grey Wolf's mother.

Serhat Kılıç heads up the supporting cast as the narrator Salih Bozok but seems curiously absent for all the major events depicted while Özge Özpirinçci and Ezgi Mola are required to carry what little emotional content the film has as the competing love interests and Burhan Güven, Bartunç Akbaba and Kaan Olcay round things out as various incarnations of Atatürk.

The director deliberately sets out to avoid any perceived insult to the Turkish image of their founder and in this respect at least succeeds like any other uninspired hagiography with a loosely strung together episodic collection of supposedly inspiring well-worn incidents from the Grey Wolf's life which ultimately serve to give no true insight into the man himself.

"Unfortunately, words are not enough "

Incoherent The film "Veda"directed by Zülfü Livaneli, made in 2010 is a film based on the memoirs of "Salih bozok". A weak drama whose biggest problem is indecisiveness in dealing with the subject. The film is not coherent in this sense. And this has caused even the editing of the film to be undecided. Although the film has been successful in sales, it is structurally weak. In general, the film remains a linear narrative from a diary in praise of Atatürk. From Turkish cinema, much stronger and prominent films have been released at the world level. Movies that will always remain in the history of world cinema.

Of course it's not a Darkest Hour or Der Untergang. But it's a decent movie.

Even CGI are not that bad. War props are even good.

Cars look so new because they couldn't aged classic cars. But it's Ok

Scenes are overly dramatized but it's a blockbuster movie for Turkey so It's a must for our market.

Story is Great but lots of incidents happens in a short time so no time for war and most of the politics.

Zülfü Livaneli. You are a decent moviemaker. Decent storyteller. And it is your masterpiece. Very well done. But where is Ismet Pasha?

If this movie is outstanding, it is certainly by it's ability to dodge any depth. No significant analysis of any character, no solid study of the historical context or stake, just a superficial picture of the events through a soap-like art. The author's purpose to grossly suggest along the movie his narration is a jewel of subtle understatement, as a reflection of the oriental sensibility, doesn't produce any effect but a real tediousness. Confronting with such imposture, one could naturally consider this a suggested work to embellish a vanishing symbol, facing times of trouble. It's few to say this subject deserves a better handling: the birth of a modern nation, the fate of millions of people involved, yesterday and today, the difficult questions of liberty and democracy are the real, complete and achieved understatement here.

This is one of the bests in my life! Most of all picture, sound and music is awesome. Story is incredible. As I see Livneli tried to summarize all his life with excellent symbolic events. Unfortunately some people aren't able to think deeply to understand some messages there. I am comparing my history knowledge and movie and I see that Livaneli tried for example to tell all his opinion about secularism with just one well thought scene. It is always easier to say that was not true, the harder one is to be able to say yes he was secularist, we don't know this really happened but thats what Atatürk exactly thought. Which commander dances before going to War? You cant answer this question if you don't know that Zeybek is played by Heros! Which leader has said until today war is a murder if it is not done for defending? He did not turn to Selanik because the defending was over and that would be attack, namely murder! This film is criticized by the people who don't understand the cinema but seems like so, instead of that real cinema criticizers and average public likes this movie very much. I have never seen a movie which was applauded with tears at the end. Thank you Livaneli millions of times thank you! Please ignore the negative comments we know why do they do this! We are aware of everything. I believe this musics will get so many prizes!