Menderes Samancılar

Ayşe (47) lives with her brother Rıdvan (38), who has down syndrome, on the outer edge of the ever-growing Istanbul, where the face has begun to change. Their father has been waiting for death in a hospital for a long time. When Ayşe receives a marriage proposal from an international truck driver who stops by the gas station where she works, she makes a choice between her destiny and her dreams.

Songül is about to finish her shift at the hospital where she works as a nurse. Upon learning that her husband Hakkı, whom she is about to leave, is coming home to collect his belongings, she decides to go home later to avoid seeing him.

During his military service in 1990's Southeast Turkey, Ahmet experiences something that will haunt him for the rest of his life. In 2013, when the chaotic days of Gezi Park protests in Istanbul start, Ahmet learns he has a brain tumor. Just as the lines between truth and fiction, the dream and the reality start to get blurred for him, he meets Serap; the love of his life. But time is ticking and his painful past weighs down on him every day, suffocating him with the same question: Who is the child that plays hide and seek with him?

Tuncel Kurtiz is an international actor who has worked in various countries such as Turkey, Germany, and Sweden throughout his fifty-year career. He has starred in countless works in cinema, stage and television and has received many awards, including the Silver Bear at the Berlin Film Festival. He has directed two documentaries and a feature-length fiction film. Kurtiz's acting performance ranges from popular melodramas to major plays such as Mahabharata (Peter Brook), encompassing many different genres and styles. As an actor, Kurtiz believes in the creative power of chaos: 'Chaos is the most difficult to create / Not a false chaos / Many things come out of chaos'. Through testimonies, film excerpts, and archive footage, this documentary reflects Tuncel Kurtiz's diverse body of artistic work in all its dimensions for the first time. In the background of this detailed portrait are Turkey's turbulent years and the reality of exile.

In Paris' cosmopolitan and colorful 10th arrondissement, Philippe, who's fresh out of prison, crosses paths with Avdal, a Kurd who is trying to track down an Iraqi war criminal. Avdal, who dreams of staying in France, plans to bring his fiancee Siba to Paris. She's due to arrive in the next few days. The two men strike up a friendship and when Avdal dies suddenly and unexpectedly, Philippe finds himself left to organize the funeral arrangements. What should he do with the body? Siba arrives in Paris, and soon learns that Avdal has died. She is taken in by a group of Kurdish men and before long she also meets Philippe - all of whom are quite smitten by her beauty. Meanwhile, Avdal's father Cheto, a devout Muslim, comes to Paris to grieve for his son. He intends to force Siba to return to her homeland, but the young woman has now had a taste of freedom.

Nuri, whose sole aim is to return to Istanbul by selling a garden left to him by his father, has an interesting encounter with his old friend Sabri in the city. Sabri, however, has just smashed his boss's head in due to sudden psychological trauma he suffered at the government office where he works, and things start to get even more complicated. As Nuri prepares to return to Istanbul, he receives news that his friend Sabri has committed suicide in prison. Now Nuri has a purpose. He decides to uncover the reasons behind his old friend Sabri's mysterious murder and suicide.

Haunted by his dark past, a man takes a job as a fire warden in a remote tower in the wilderness, and is inexorably drawn towards a young woman with a terrible secret of her own.

At the times of World War II, accomplished painter and translator Aram flees Istanbul due to political offenses. When he is trapped at the USSR-Georgia borders, his flight turns into a remembrance of things past...

Yakup and Şemsa are Assyrians living in Berlin with their three children and grandchildren. Twenty-five years ago they migrated from Mardin to Berlin. One day they receive a phone call from Mardin. This unexpected call deals with their son Mikhael, whom they lost twenty-five years ago. All the suffering of the family is refreshed. Yakup and Şemsa go to Mardin with their grandchildren, Nardin, who do not want to leave them alone. This trip will be the beginning of all their personal journeys. When the craftsman Yakup, who had not come for years, abandoned his village and saw his house looted; He will go after his house door. On his journey of finding the door, he will be accompanied by her granddaughter Nardin and the smuggler Remzi.

No synopsis available yet.

Set against the backdrop of construction activity promising to fill in the empty spaces of the urban landscape with entirely new neighborhoods, a story unfolds of an aging construction worker who, unlike his peers, has to drop all plans for the future after being diagnosed with a malignant tumor. This self-assured debut contemplates the dignity of the individual within the context of modern Turkish society.

Ismet is a Turkish soldier, who was on duty at the border as a Commander of the Coast Guard and recently got retired. Now as a civilian, he struggles to communicate with his family and people surrounding him. His only son abandoned him and left to the U.S.

Laborers of the film industry have decided to march against the new censorship act in 1977. 60 years of silence in cinema was going to be interrupted for good. From actor/actresses to set workers, 400 women and men have started a 5-day-long walk to Ankara. A walk that was conceived with supportive but surprised looks of the public. The documentary tries to picture this forgotten but historical event in the light of the 100th year of cinema.

Lisa is a young designer from Paris. She is starting to work as an independent designer and she wants to make a fashion show. A friend of her, a girl named Hêlin persuades Lisa to make the show in Diyarbakir, telling her that in there you can find the most beautiful girls to parade as models.

Bahadır, an aspiring 35-year-old director, spends his life making cheap television films inspired by the stories of folk songs. On the other hand, he has a great ambition to make films like his idol, Tarkovsky. He stands between his dreams and the real, tragicomic conditions.

When Nejdet learns that the other mafia bosses he works with are plotting behind his back, he decides to teach them a lesson. The biggest surprise he has in store is his son, whom he has kept hidden from everyone for many years. However, Berk, a conservatory graduate, is a ballet dancer. The young man, who knows nothing about any of this, dreams of becoming a principal ballet dancer. Berk, who lives a modest life with his ballerina girlfriend, suddenly finds himself caught up in a showdown between the mafia bosses. Moreover, the most powerful and feared among them is his own father.

In the southeast region of Turkey, the Kurdish family of Altun lives in a small mountainside village plagued by a 25-year war that makes their daily lives a hellish struggle. As the war intensifies, the family is forced to migrate west to the city of Istanbul.

Riza is a truck driver. When his truck breaks down, Riza can’t work and his livelihood is threatened. Using every possible means, he desparately tries to drum up the money for the repairs. And this includes being prepared to commit a brutal crime.

The brother of Mevlevi Sheikh Ahmet Nurettin is thrown into prison despite being innocent. Dervish believes that his brother will eventually return because he is innocent. However, his hopes are shattered when the judge sentences his brother to death. The dervish embarks on a great reckoning within himself, decides to confront those responsible, and begins to incite the people to revolt. Over time, he himself will become part of the very power he opposes...

Ten years old Cemil runs away from his stepfather who tortures him and his mother and ends up in Istanbul. Veli Firat Tanis, the leader of a gang which Cemil takes refuge in Haydarpasa, tries to send him back to his home by putting his pocket money. While the gang gather money for Cemil, they, at the same time, suffer from harsh living conditions. In the mean time Cemil's mother Münevver comes to Istanbul in the hope of finding her son.

Bahar (Nurgül Yeşilçay) is sent to New York because a serious illness. Treated in hospital Seymen Aga (Özcan Deniz) and Bahar try together to overcome this disease. Seymen Aga trying to be as strong as possible and not to give up. In Kapadokya, where their family and friends, they are waiting for the good news from the U.S..

No synopsis available yet.

Mavi Sürgün is a fictionalized account of one period of the life of a Turkish journalist who was condemned to exile for an article he wrote in 1925. He turned his punishment into a reward by creating a little paradise in what is today the holiday resort, Bodrum. In fact he is considered by some to be the first ecologist. The film concentrates on this latter aspect of his character and through flashbacks portrays the inner turmoil of a man who is trying to come to terms with his past. The slow pace is somewhat of a drawback, the flashbacks are often confusing and the protagonist is not always very convincing. But the photography of the country side is exceptional Kenan Ormanlar and the short appearance by a very theatrical Hanna Schygulla of Fassbinder fame adds a little spice to the drama.

The film is based on 'Fikrimin Ince Gulu', a novel by Adalet Agaoglu, which depicts a first generation gurbetci/guest-worker returning home. It covers his land journey in short bursts from Germany to the Turkey's west border - and extensively from thereon to his village close to Ankara - capital of Turkey. He begins his journey purchasing a second hand yellow Mercedes - possibly his first car - using his meager savings working as a laborer. Offering deep insight into the mind of a manual laborer Bayram (Ilyas Salman) making his first trip back home, resorting to flashbacks in highlighting Bayram's motivation and experiences from his childhood right up to the events leading to his first departure from Turkey to Germany.

Tomix, Tam-Tam and Mützen-Jacky are children of the street earning their living with music. They travel from one town to the other with their instruments to perform in the streets and in restaurants. Making music is the only thing they have ever learned. They are led by old Mahmud, an alcoholic. He is the one who concludes the business and takes in the money.

A dwarf and a transvestite, both are excluded from the society and doomed to exist at night. Their lives overlap in a strange encounter and this becomes the start of their friendship.

Once a successful dancer, Miriam has abandoned her career to bring up her son, Serge, after her boyfriend walked out of her.

No synopsis available yet.

Ahmet Celal, who was injured during the war, is in great pain and a young woman named Emine helps him and saves him and heals him. A stormy love breaks out in those scenes and the intrigued life of that love is worked out.

After 17 years as a laborer in Germany, Mehmet is deported and his wife and son remain in Germany. Unable to come back legally, Mehmet embarks on a long and dangerous journey to return to Germany illegally.

In this biographical drama, the Turkish writer Rifat Ilgaz (Tarik Akan) is forced to go into internal exile after World War Two, because the government suspects him of being a communist. Most of the movie follows him while he is on the lam, and during his reunion with his wife, who grows testy from the restrictions that hiding him impose on her. Eventually he turns himself in, and while in prison, suffers some torture. All the same, he endures with the flame of his spirit undiminished.

No synopsis available yet.

In 1940s Turkey, the war is recently over, but the wounds are still fresh, and the WWII is going on next door. A different family lives in each room of a mansion. They all lead a scarce life but hold on to life with hope.

Istambul, 1967. Two women meet at Avrenos, a tavern in the old city. Nouchi, the brunette, is mourning the death of Bernard de Jonsac, an employee of the French Embassy who recently died. It is Lélia, the blonde, who asked her to come. She wants to understand the ties that bound them both to Jonsac, to understand the strange couple that this desperate dandy formed with Nouchi, the ex-Bulgarian bar girl. Lélia, the middle-class woman from Istanbul, wants to understand at last, ten years after the tragedy that has left her confined to a wheelchair for life...

The film depicts the struggles of a poor family. A father who repairs shoes works alongside his two sons. The father wants his eldest son, Mehmet, to find another job. Mehmet decides to work as a cotton picker with his wife and children. Ali, the younger son who cannot get along with his father, also begins working with them. The father suggests that they all work together to pool their money and then renovate the shop. Upon this, the entire family goes to pick cotton. However, things will not go as planned for the family embarking on this new venture.

The mythological love story of two Kurdish youth.

Some time ago, Robert took some photos of military action which are now endangering his life. He is on the run from those who would find their publication damaging and is headed for Syria, where he believes he will be safe. While in Istanbul, he meets a pop singer, a woman half his age who gives him the erotic charge of his life. He begins taking film of their bedroom encounters and says some pretty excessive things about how marvelous she is to him. Meanwhile, his local friends don't trust or like him enough to help him stay in Istanbul, and it seems that he will have to continue onward in his journey to safety.

Three episodes, all with relatively similar plots about a love triangle between a woman and two men.

No synopsis available yet.

No synopsis available yet.

Story of a village girl who transforms into a courageous and independent woman and fights against the men who destroyed her life.

The couple, who are married and have two children, are in the process of divorcing. Problems that have accumulated throughout their marriage have led them to decide to separate. During the divorce proceedings, they will reevaluate their relationship and marriage.

In this film that wavers unsteadily between a comedy and a tragedy, Murtaza (Mujdat Gezen) is a deluded security guard whose fanatical reverence for "duty" verges on the psychotic. He is incapable of seeing himself for what he is -- and as a consequence he is often the unwitting and unknowing brunt of jokes. His wife and daughters are painfully aware of his shortcomings, but they generally suffer in silence. One of the daughters ends up working in the factory to help the family out financially, and when Murtaza finds her sleeping on the job one night he hits her so hard she eventually dies from the blow. Though that is not the end of it, by any means.

No synopsis available yet.

Two Turkish brothers find themselves on opposite sides of the political fence. When one of the brothers is murdered, the boys' father suspects that his surviving son was instrumental in the killing. Celebrated film director Elia Kazan returns to his acting roots in a key supporting role.

Ferdi, who went to Germany with his father years ago, now wants to return to his homeland. He marries his girlfriend Ayten and returns to his country. He begins living with his mother and uncle, who have been waiting for him for years. However, his relationship with his uncle, to whom he has been sending money for years, deteriorates. Because he did not marry his uncle's daughter, his uncle and cousins become hostile toward Ferdi. While Ferdi and Ayten try to establish a new life together, his cousins will seek revenge against him.

The film tells the story of Seyyid, who is trying to build a new life after being released from prison. Seyyid has just been released from prison, where he was sent because of a blood feud. His enemies are waiting for an opportunity to kill him. Having escaped his enemies, Seyyid comes to Istanbul and starts working as a carpenter. He leads a quiet and solitary life. One day, he meets Sedef at a nightclub. This encounter quickly turns into love. The couple will fight to leave their enemies behind and start a new life together.

No synopsis available yet.

In the 1930s in Konya, Turkey, the famous belly dancer Cemile dreams of going to the big city. Murat falls in love with her.

The film is about the life of a gigolo. Bekir, a gigolo, is with a rich woman named Oya. One day, Oya hits a woman with her car. Bekir helps the woman who was in the accident. At the hospital, he meets Esra, the woman's roommate. A friendship develops between Bekir and Esra, who is a sex worker. They fall in love with each other. Bekir wants to build a life with Esra. For this reason, he decides to rob Oya's house with his brother. However, things will not go as Bekir planned.

The story of a young woman who abandoned her husband and ran away with the man she had been in love with since her childhood.

A teenager who is brave and naive from Black Sea region, ends in jail during the World War 2 time. The movie tells about the story of this teenager.

Ferdi, a taxi driver who works nights, encounters many of the city’s more hidden and harsh sides after dark. Zeynep is on the run from a mob connected to the nightlife business. One faithful night brings them together

The tragic story of three farm worker who migrates from their village to the cotton land Çukurova.

Based on real events, this story traces a young district governor’s moral awakening as he confronts a powerful landowner in rural Adana. What begins as a routine bureaucratic act soon turns into a struggle to shield villagers from exploitation, greed, and the threat of malaria.

No synopsis available yet.

In "The Bride with the Black Veil" (1975), director Süreyya Duru continues to focus on social issues, exposing problems of the peasants and feodal relations.

No synopsis available yet.

No synopsis available yet.

No synopsis available yet.