When I first moved to Istanbul, movies were a familiar comfort in an unfamiliar city. As I got older, like most people, life became busier, and finding an excuse to sit down, pick a film, and still go to sleep at a reasonable hour became harder than getting a seat on the M2 at 6 p.m.
So every year, the Istanbul Film Festival has become my way of carving out that time again and reconnecting with cinema. The festival is spread across seven different venues, each with its own character, and this year I want to revisit four films that lingered long past their screenings.
Kicking off the festival at the ICEC, the first screening was Three Goodbyes, based on a book by Michela Murgia. The movie follows a couple’s lives after their separation and is set in Rome, with historic landmarks and charming neighborhood streets that give the film a vivid sense of place. It throws you into the deep end, exploring themes of loss, self-discovery and mortality.
The direction is very slice-of-life-esque, as we see the couple’s daily routines and relationships. And I never knew where they would take me next which effectively held my attention and left a poignant aftertaste. I was left with a fleeting thought of how quickly life can change direction and a new craving for Arancini.
The next film is Life After Siham, screened at Kadıköy’s Sinematek/Sinema Evi. The building was recently constructed by the Kadıköy municipality and connected to a beautiful 19th-century wooden mansion. Life After Siham is a documentary that follows an Egyptian family of four living in France and is told through the son Namir’s perspective. After his mother’s passing, Namir retraces their past through letters and stories to keep her memory alive. Through his narration, we see the love story between his parents, Siham and Waguih while exploring themes of love, Christianity, exile from their homeland and their migration to France.
Life After Siham was a moving yet vulnerable documentary that paints a beautiful family portrait of what once was. Watching life through Namir’s camera lens, with home footage that made it feel like I was personally invited into someone’s life.
Yet as I left the theater and stood in the elevator with a few others, I realized not everyone found it as moving as I did. An older couple was telling what I assumed was their child that they didn’t find the film particularly special. It made me think that perhaps some parents may not fully understand the effort it takes to preserve their memory in a child’s mind, but to each their own. Siham lives within Namir’s memories, pictures and videos. And despite the title, the movie permeates a deep sense of love leaving me with a specific knot in my throat.
To break up the melancholy streak, the second film I saw was called At Work, screened at the Paribu Cinerverse at Nautilus. The story is about a successful photographer living in France who abandons his career to pursue writing, facing financial hardships in an effort to chase his dreams.
With a much different tone than the previous two, we watch as our protagonist sells his valuables, moves to a cheaper accommodation and scrapes by through menial labor using a gig-economy app, similar to Armut here in Istanbul. His family mostly doesn’t understand his actions and we observe them pass judgment throughout the film.
The movie raised a lot of questions for me, I found myself wondering why not take on a teaching role or even a photography-adjacent career while pursuing his passion. Nonetheless, the film itself portrays the reality of chasing a passion in a gig economy in an interesting, uplifting way.
The final film was also held at Sinematek/Sinema Evi. As a Persian, I usually avoid watching Iranian cinema due to its tendency to leave me in tears but I decided to forgo my predisposition for Bidad.
The film follows an aspiring young singer called Seti, and her efforts to sing in front of a live mixed audience despite laws banning such performances. After gaining online attention through street singing, a clash with authorities leads to her rescue by a stranger she later names “Bebin” (common exclamation that means ‘look’).
The story also explores her strained relationship with her alcoholic mother, and we see a look at a more emotional side beneath her carefree Gen-Z appearance. Eventually detained for her actions, her time in prison shatters her voice and after being released pending a trial, she speaks with a speech impediment. Later on, our stranger Bebin, helps Seti find her voice.
Bidad tells a hopeful story set in a restrictive environment, with an unfiltered portrayal of artistic resilience and a quietly powerful ending that lingers long after the credits.
For more information, be sure to follow the official website for the Istanbul Film Festival, as well as their Instagram.
Featured image by Mete Kaan Özdilek.
