{"id":9114,"date":"2012-01-24T20:31:32","date_gmt":"2012-01-24T20:31:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.aaeurop.com\/?p=9114"},"modified":"2012-01-29T18:38:12","modified_gmt":"2012-01-29T18:38:12","slug":"a-powerful-turkish-cinematic-condemnation-of-state-organized-genocide-by-professor-hovhannes-i-pilikian","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aaeurop.com\/?p=9114","title":{"rendered":"A Powerful Turkish Cinematic Condemnation of State-organized Genocide: by Professor Hovhannes I. Pilikian"},"content":{"rendered":"

Film-Review; Gelecek Uzun S\u0569\u0085\u0539\u055erer<\/em><\/strong> (2011\/Turkey)\/ The Future Lasts Forever,<\/em><\/strong> Written and directed by \u0569\u0085\u0539\u0090zcan Alper<\/strong><\/p>\n

British Gala Night; 24th<\/sup> January, 2011, 7.30 pm. at the Cineworld, Wood Green, London. <\/strong><\/p>\n

Someone high-up at the Turkish Ministry of Culture and Tourism<\/strong> must be an enlightened Soul and more of a Democrat than any of the Eurocrats, having subsidized this film by \u0569\u0085\u0539\u0090zcan Alper.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 <\/strong>May that highly evolved Soul become a Prime Minster of a truly democratic Turkey one day, proud of its multi-ethnic constituents rather than the ridiculous ultra-nationalist mantra \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093Proud is the Man who is a Turk\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d nonsense \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c sang throughout schools in Turkey under the portrait of an Atat\u0569\u0085\u0539\u055erk framed with Crescent flags.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

Whoever is that enlightened Soul, I hope he can free Zarak\u0569\u0085\u0549\u0080\u0098glu<\/strong> and Leila Zana<\/strong> and many others from prison, and shield Turkish intellectuals from the evils of Article 301<\/em><\/strong> of the criminal penal code, by abolishing it altogether<\/em><\/strong> from the forthcoming new Constitution of Turkey.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 I hope that the latter shall not be yet another political Ottoman-type trickery to genocide more people.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

And, whatever you are up to, dear Reader, do not miss the first five minutes of this masterly film \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c As if in a live theatre, in the total darkness, a cock crows \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c a detail suggesting that we are in a village \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c dogs bark, cows moo, horses neigh, suddenly the unexpected sound of helicopters approaching, women and children shriek, bombs explode, machine-guns shoot, a horrible mixture of the sounds of war<\/em><\/strong>, the screen lights up with a most beautiful horse, racing for his life, his breathing cleverly amplified on the microphones (an excellent detail of a sensitive film-director), the target of the mortal hullabaloo, running away like a proud Kurdish peshmerga<\/em><\/strong>, a mountain guerilla fighter trying to survive an unfair battle with a US-equipped genocidal State-army.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Horse successfully avoids the first shot, but on the second he finally falls, blood down his beautiful belly, like a pregnant woman, struggles to get up to fight another day, but sadly it cannot because of a third shot from an invisible sniper, and gradually, slowly with his back turned to the viewer as if in deep shame that he could not survive<\/em><\/strong>, stretches his legs and dies like a Swan, like a Tchaikovsky-ballerina in a most beautiful breathtaking posture \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb the film-director has succeeded in a most remarkable way to instantly create an immediate emotional<\/em><\/strong> bond between his film and the viewer, something Anglo-Saxon film-directors have yet to learn to achieve in Hollywood!\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

Alper\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s Horse is as much a classical symbol and the metaphor for human freedom. As my psychologist wife, Clare Pilikian<\/strong> confirms; you can lasso a wild horse to tame it, but kill it?\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 Never! To kill a horse is the lowest point of barbarism and criminal depravity \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb only inhuman wretches of genocidal intent are capable of such an atrocity.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

And you would not be wrong to presume as much, as during the film you will soon discover through the eyewitness accounts that such a genocidal crime was indeed committed by the Turkish army, during the 1990\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s, under the very filthy noses of our Western imperialist governments tacitly encouraging the Turkish State, arming it to the teeth to wipe off 8 thousand Kurdish villages off the map of central Anatolia, once the lands of very ancient Armenia \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb where the horse was first \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056d\u009cdomesticated\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7 historically<\/em><\/strong>.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 Rock-carvings, archeological bones-evidence, backed by classical literary reference (Xenophon\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s Anabasis<\/em><\/strong>) prove the existence of horse-cults in the Armenian Anatolian Highlands, precisely where the Kurdish horses are being slaughtered in this film today<\/em><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

The greatest single obscenity of modern imperialist history is the fact that the Kurdish people<\/em><\/strong>, a huge majority of perhaps 60 million<\/em><\/strong>, spread through several countries of the Middle East, still lack a homeland<\/em><\/strong>.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Ottoman Young Turks<\/em><\/strong> that attempted to genocide the Armenians in 1915 intended to do the same to the Kurds<\/em><\/strong> (they said so to Morgenthau, the American Ambassador in Ottoman Turkey), after abusing their unsophisticated, un-educated, illiterate tribal leaders to do their genocidal dirty job.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 The present-day enlightened Kurdish leadership (their Parliament-in-exile) has already apologized profusely and profoundly to the Armenian people for their earlier leaders\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7 ignorant participation in the Young Turk<\/em><\/strong> crime, having understood today<\/em><\/strong> that the Turkish state did finally come round to doing the same to them in our own days<\/em><\/strong>, when Kurds were arrested and tortured and killed in prisons for merely speaking Kurdish at home<\/em><\/strong> \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c Leila Zana, a Kurdish MP is back in prison today, having already been there for a decade previously \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb And the first national hero of\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 the Kurds who could transcend tribalism and medieval Sharia<\/em><\/strong> laws against women, Abdullah \u0569\u0085\u0539\u0090calan<\/strong>, who could bring total peace and democratic federalism to Turkey has been in solitary incarceration on the Imrali island<\/em> in the Sea of Marmara<\/em> since 1999 \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb hilariously, 1000 military personnel guard him \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c <\/em><\/strong>How more ridiculous the Turkish State-genocidal madness can be!\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 \u0569\u0085\u0539\u0090calan\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s first Islamic name in Arabic means God\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s slave<\/em><\/strong>, not Mr. Erdogan\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s slave \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb unless of course the latter thinks he is Allah<\/em><\/strong> himself, which is not unlikely.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Turkish State has this strange Sado-Masochist habit of killing their friends<\/em><\/strong> \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb it is what the Young Turk<\/em><\/strong> Leaders did to their Armenian Masonic<\/em><\/strong> bosom friends, ignoring and betraying their Masonic obligation to protect them at all costs<\/em><\/strong> from such violence! They killed Hrant Dink<\/strong>, their greatest Armenian friend trying to forge a brotherhood with the Turks!\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 They made a song and dance for decades about Kurds being \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093Mountain Turks\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d<\/em><\/strong>, only to kill even their \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb horses!\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 What if the Turks were \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb field-Kurds thus murdering their own brothers!\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

Sitting before a wall of thousands of passport-sized photographs of victims, the survivors tell the camera of their true experience of the Turkish soldiery invading their villages, separating men from women and children, and simply massacring them for absolutely no reason<\/em><\/strong>\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb when all alive are dead, they attack the stables, their horses!<\/p>\n

The Turkish army would enter a Kurdish village; give the inhabitants an hour to desert their homes, before they burn down the lot, thus creating 4 million refugees of Kurds within their own homelands, anciently of Armenia<\/em><\/strong>.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

In a blue-tinged documentary film within the film, you witness tanks with Polis<\/em><\/strong> (in Turkish) inscribed on them, stopping in a village, soldiers jumping out of their tank-holes with machine guns, tearing boys from their screaming mothers and beating them to a pulp before your very eyes! \u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093By 1992, a way of killing people was found fit for Kurds, called murder by unknown assailants\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d<\/em><\/strong> \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 \u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0I could \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056d\u009csee\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7 my very own maternal grandmother<\/em><\/strong> named Isgouhi<\/em><\/strong> (= the true one<\/em>) Der-Arsenian<\/em><\/strong> (= of the Male God<\/em>) sitting there with the same black scarf covering her head, looking like a raven, telling us how the Turkish gendarmes<\/em> came to their village Khassgal-Izmit<\/em><\/strong> searching for \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb weapons.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 They dragged out her teenage sons, beat them mercilessly and pointlessly \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb My grandparents later had to buy some rusted gun-bits from some bashibozuks<\/em> to hand them over to the Ottoman cut-throats in case they returned for future inspections.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

And my grandmother Isgouhi<\/em><\/strong> Der -Arsenian<\/em><\/strong> used to sing those heart-braking laments and lullabies, which did not sound like true lullabies, but more like goodbyes to the dead children \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb from murdered mothers \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c precisely what the Kurdish women do in this film in front of walls covered with a thousand faces \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

And Sumru (played Oscar-winningly by Gaye G\u0569\u0085\u0539\u055ersel<\/strong>), a shapely young university post-graduate from Istanbul, records them with shocked intensity, although she is a kind of Turk, and does not know Kurdish.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 She is shown with her boyfriend (Harun) on a bus full of Kurdish students amidst \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb Turkish Crescent-flags, but singing Vinceremos<\/em><\/strong> = we shall be victorious \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c and here is an unpredictable eye-catching detail \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c the students sing not<\/em><\/strong> sitting-down in the bus (as you would expect), but standing-up<\/em><\/strong> and applauding \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb it proves an original directorial mind at work.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

Cut to a scene on a train, the window imprinted heavily with the nationalist Crescent silhouetted through a succession of mountainous landscapes and a lake (Van<\/em><\/strong>?)\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 The Crescent finally disappears \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c we are traveling through (Armenian) Kurdistan \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c while Sumru reads a sweet sad letter from Harun informing her that he had to go \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb he knows he is not coming back because he will be killed \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c the violence of the state is always incomparably greater than that of the rebels<\/em><\/strong> \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c nevertheless, he hopes, just hopes against hope that perhaps \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb he\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7ll see her again one day, perhaps in another world, and signs \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093your lover from the Mountains\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d!\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

Sumru (whose name means Summit<\/em>!) gets out at Diyarbakir, today the capital city of the non-existent Kurdistan, yesterday\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s Tigranagert<\/em><\/strong> (= build by Tigran<\/strong>) the Great<\/strong>, the capital city built by the Armenian King whose empire in 180 BC stretched down to Palestine, from where <\/em>King Tigran<\/strong> had transported a whole community of Jews<\/em><\/strong> to enliven with trade the very life of his brand-new city \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb The speakers announce that trains have arrived from Istanbul, Ankara and Malatya, establishing Diyarbakir as the multi-ethnic hub joining major sections of the Turkish map.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 Yet, the camera pulls back to show you a blue-uniformed Turkish policeman on the platform\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 watching the crowds intently \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb Such telling details are abundant in this film \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c Alper<\/strong>, like all great creative artists, couples with his perfect grasp of the overall image, a masterly eye for the constituent detail.<\/p>\n

Sumru reassures her mother by mobile that Diyarbakiris not as dangerous as the Istanbulis think it is \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb no bombs exploding in the streets, even though her own heart is shattered by the absence of her Kurdish boy-friend who had left her three years ago to join the PKK guerillas<\/strong> in the mountains.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 She has had no news from him since.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

As if to avenge herself on the people, Sumru goes around with her tape-recorder documenting the sounds of the city, holding her high-tech microphones at waist-level \u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0pushing it forward like a small machine-gun<\/em><\/strong> startling the war-worn inhabitants \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb the city with its famous black basalt walls can suddenly throw up a Roman ruin still habitable.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 Sumru finds the film-maker Ahmet (played perfectly by Durukan Ordu<\/strong>), who fancies himself as the \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056d\u009cTurkish\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7 Al Pacino<\/em>, but instead has been documenting the eyewitness accounts of the current genocide his people are undergoing by the post-modern Turkish state.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 The Turkish state can deny the genocide of the Armenians in 1915 all they want, argue that it could have been a massacre \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c as if a massacre being less than a genocide were permissible \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb but surely, no sane person could deny that the Kurds today<\/em><\/strong>, on the watch of the Anglo-American imperialists are being massacred only and only for the sole reason of being \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb Kurds<\/em><\/strong>!\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 If that is not genocide, then Turkey\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s Prime Minister Mr. Erdogan is the \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb Vatican Pope \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c Hear ye, Dan Brown, a new international bestseller for thee about a crypto-Turk as a Catholic Pope, shot by an ASALA <\/strong>crypto-Armenian as a Mountain-Turk terrorist!\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

Love Impossible\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 \u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 \u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

There is an intense attraction between Sumru and Ahmet, but the genocidal context of their relationship is such that the two can never develop any natural human warmth into any form of sexuality.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 This secondary theme of the film is developed so skillfully and sensitively as to be one of its most original aspects \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c the impossibility of love developing<\/em><\/strong> let alone blossoming, even though the desire is there all along haunting their every waking moment.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 I shall be seventy soon, and have seen a thousand films, but have not seen yet another film on the subject, tackled with such intense humanity, sadness and compassion for the young potential lovers.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Sumru decides to exorcise the ghost of her boyfriend, by a final search, and asks Ahmet touchingly to drive her to a very dangerous area of high genocidal activity.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 Ahmet refuses point blank.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 Sumru has even a telephone conversation with Ahmet to thank him for his intellectual help and to say goodbye. But a jump cut suddenly shows us an endless seeming road, a close up on Sumru as the passenger in the front seat, and finally a camera shift to the driver being \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb Ahmet. \u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0We now hear that Ahmet\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s Dad was a truck-driver working on the roads to Iran, one of the countries that harbor a considerable population of Kurds (the film is dedicated to two Iranian film-makers in-prison).\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 As a child, Ahmet had witnessed the death of his father shot from behind in the public square of their village \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c obviously another peshmerga<\/em>-victim by unknown assailants…<\/p>\n

More than a genocide-film \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c Lighting Lessons for film-industry<\/p>\n

On his blue tinged TV screen, Ahmet had watched one of his archival films of a boat carrying a gigantic statue of Lenin \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb reclined \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c No Soviet sculptor would dare portray Lenin as anything but a stand-up god!\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 Now, under the moonlight, unable to sleep, having just enjoyed the hospitality of a Kurdish peasant family, Ahmet and Sumru talk of their dreams for the future \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c through this dialogue, half-lit like a painting in dark-orange moonlight, the film-director suddenly effectively and affectively emotionally uplifts his film into the noble heights of humanity and dreamy Socialist compassion.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 NoHollywoodfilm-director is capable of displaying such emotional-intellectual cinematic depth, imparting to the film further complexities of immense significance.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

In Hollywood, believe it or not, they do not know yet how to light night-scenes \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb because they are concerned that their film-goers are so dumb as to want to see everything all the time on the screen.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 Turkish film-directors have no such inhibitions \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c they are not frightened of leaving dark-black sections in their night-time scenes \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c as in the lighting technique of the German Expressionist<\/em> black-and-white Cinema.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 Thus the superbly beautiful, Rembrandt-esque creative lighting of pitch-black night-scenes in Turkish films contains lessons for the international film-industry<\/em><\/strong>.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 Alper\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s night-scenes in this film are a case in point.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Ahmet dreams of a true-socialist future (the film\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s title translated into English is The Future Lasts Forever<\/em><\/strong>), which he defines poetically as being able to ride his \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb bicycle one day with Sumru skirting the coastline of the Black Sea stretching through several \u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0countries and their borders, reaching the city of\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 Varna<\/em>, in Bulgaria \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb when people everywhere would work no more than 5 hours a day<\/em><\/strong> \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb something the British imperialists are desperate to destroy throughout the European community, adopting the Nazi ideal of raping populations to death by slave-work, to merely fatten the capitalist Fat Cat Bankers and swine!\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 Alper\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s film thus achieves instantly a universalism beyond its immediate theme of state-organized genocides.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0O-ro-ro-tsa-yin \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c the Armenian Lullaby\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

The socialism-dreaming Ahmet drives Sumru at dawn to the local cemetery covered in snow and romantic mist (for which the climate in the Rize<\/em> district of Hamshen <\/em><\/strong>is famous). <\/em><\/strong>Ahmet, in deep sensitivity gives Sumru space to look for Harun\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s grave, while he like the mountain-Kurd that he is wanders off into the beautiful landscape.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 Sumru, skillfully underplayed by the actress, goes from grave to grave, almost (you feel palpably) hoping that she would not find it \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb and alas, alack unfortunately she suddenly hits upon it \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb a gradual sob bursts on her face, pulling her up and pushing her into the opposite direction Ahmet had taken \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb You know that their love shall be even more impossible now \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb a wild black horse on white snow wanders aimlessly \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb<\/p>\n

And what a creative originality of conception; you would think that Harun\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s now proven \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056d\u009cdisappearance\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7 would be the open door through which the potential lovers could find the happiness they deserved as a couple, so well-suited to one another \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb instead, even the potential of such a joy of future life is destroyed as a direct result of\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 the ongoing genocide. On a long shot, the couple getting gradually more lost in the mountain fog and mist developing, the film soundtrack plays a most beautiful Armenian lullaby, accompanied on saz<\/em><\/strong> (recorded by Ludvig Durian<\/strong>, music by Khatchatur Avetissian<\/strong>) orchestrated with a haunting melisma<\/em> (sang majestically by the Chamber Music Choir of Radio Yerevan<\/em>), rendering the last five minutes of the film as un-missable as its first five minutes \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb and the gems in between.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

And the greatest of these gems is the one, right in the mid-stream of the film-flow, transforming it into a most complex and skillfully constructed film-script of immense depth and historical significance \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c and here is how;\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

Sumru, whether by luck or by design, playing as intelligently ambiguous as possible, comes across the ruins of a dilapidated Armenian church, Sourp Giragos, Ermeni Kilisesi, Dyarbakir<\/em><\/strong> \u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0in the care of an old Armenian (played by Sarkis Seropyan<\/strong>, a colleague of the murdered Hrant Dink).\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 His script-name Antranig<\/em><\/strong> in Armenian has several semantic referents, most importantly meaning the First-born \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb (here) of Anatolia<\/em><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

The people of Turkey do know that the Armenians were the very first people in Anatolia, and they were there as late as in 1915, and they are still there as crypto-Turks, born of the thousands of the stolen young girls during the genocide<\/em><\/strong> \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb Talaat, the great genocider and the grand Vizier of the Young Turks<\/em><\/strong> wanted only a single Armenian left on this planet, to be skinned and stuffed as a Museum piece! <\/em><\/strong>\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0Today, there are 10 million the world over, plus perhaps 3 million as crypto-Turks, the Turks of Hamshen all<\/em><\/strong> being such<\/p>\n

Antranig was also the famous guerilla commander, the \u0569\u0085\u0539\u0090calan of the Armenian people<\/em><\/strong> fighting for survival. The bekji<\/em> (= caretaker) Antranig of the Diyarbakir-church has daughters in Switzerland, but refuses to join them for a comfortable old age, and tells Sumru precisely what<\/em><\/strong> \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb Hrant Dink himself told me <\/em><\/strong>once in Istanbul explaining why, oblivious for his own personal safety, he would never leave Turkey; \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093anonts vosgornereh ais hoghin dag en<\/em><\/strong>\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d = their bones<\/em> (implying the bones of our ancestors, let alone the massacred ones) are under this<\/strong> earth<\/em> (buried in this land).\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 The Turkish Deep-State made sure that Hrant Dink\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s bones joins them!\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

Antranig says to Sumru in Turkish, \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093you look like our girls\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 And in an absolutely masterly coup de theatre,<\/strong><\/em> the film-director suddenly lets Antranig ask in Armenian<\/em><\/strong>, \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093Haieren kidess?<\/em><\/strong> = Do you know Armenian?<\/em>\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d, and Sumru answers in (I don\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7t know if you guessed it, yes!) in fluent \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb Armenian, to tell us that she is actually \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c a second lightening! \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c Hamshentsi<\/em><\/strong> \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb a crypto-Turkish Armenian.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

The genius of this film-director shines brilliantly in the skill of inventing meaningful and conceptually original complexities with minimal means; suddenly, the present genocide attempted on the Kurds is superimposed on the genocide of the Armenians, the first-borns of Anatolia, of which the Armenian-speaking Hamshentsis<\/em> are a living proof of the plan\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s total failure. Genocides in history have never succeeded, and will never<\/em><\/strong>! \u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0The Kurds will have<\/em><\/strong> their country in the end.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 The pity of it is the waste of priceless human blood spilt, and precious human beings \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c god\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s children all \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c swallowed up by Satan, the military junk-heads of this world.<\/p>\n

\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 \"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

There is a clever third strike of a cinematic lightening in the above scenes \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c Sumru pleads with Antranig to look for and find for her his mother\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s recorded voice singing a mournful Elegy<\/em> \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb Antranig is reluctant initially, but eventually, on Sumru\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s third visit, plays the tape for her, on the porch, \u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0as rain falls heavily everywhere like the tears of all the Armenian and Kurdish mothers lamenting for their murdered children<\/em><\/strong>, while Antranig explains in Armenian that his own singing-mother was sacrificed during the 1915 chart<\/em><\/strong> \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb subtitled as genocide<\/em><\/strong> in English, the exact translation of which in Turkish would have been soyk\u0569\u008e\u0539\u0564r\u0569\u008e\u0539\u0564m<\/em><\/strong> \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c the most\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 dreaded and denied word of the post-modern Turkish state-vocabulary.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

For this fact alone, this film can be regarded as the most aesthetically satisfying political<\/em><\/strong> art-film of the last two decades of world-cinema, which brings me to the beginning of the film, on a par with perhaps the greatest political film of all time, Sergei Eisenstein\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s Battleship Potemkin<\/em><\/strong> (1925).\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

Alper\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s sequence on a par with Eisenstein\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7<\/p>\n

Its world famous sequence of sheer genius and total originality is the five minute sequence of The Odessa Steps<\/em><\/strong>; the Tsar\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s soldiery, in their light white summer tunics march down seemingly endless stone-steps rhythmically, robotically, with their bayonets stuck out like their penises, massacring the revolutionary demonstrators \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb a jump cut on a close-up of a mother pushing a baby in a pram, falls to the ground shot dead.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 The pram then rolls down the steps into the scattering panicked crowd!\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

The incident historically never took place (although The Times<\/em> of the day reported government firing on the demonstrators in the streets, never from<\/em><\/strong> the steps) \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c it was the unique invention of Eisenstein\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s genius. The second\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s appearance of the actress of Italian parentage, Beatrice Vitoldi<\/strong> made her so famous in the Soviet Union, that in 1931, she was appointed as the first Permanent Soviet Ambassador inItaly \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u00bb Sadly she was recalled toMoscow in 1937, arrested and tried during Stalin\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s Great Purge.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

Alper\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s horse-genocide sequence<\/em><\/strong> goes one better; although the scene is staged \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c I am certain no horse was killed for the filming \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c on a closer observation, one can detect a paucity of theatrical blood on the belly of the downed horse \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c in Hollywood they would have loved to have poured buckets of blood on the tranquillized animal!<\/p>\n

Although Alper\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s sequence is based on a factual story told by an eyewitness in the documentary section of the film, nevertheless the cinematic realization is entirely his own.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

And finally, fully conscious of the new found pride of the Hamshentsi Turks<\/em><\/strong> in their Armenian parentage, I can insist that the film-maker\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s surname Alper is a version of the Armenian word akhper<\/em><\/strong> = brother, very common in Eastern Armenian, in the neighborhood of Hamshen<\/em>.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 His first name, \u0569\u0083\u0549\u0080\u0093zcan<\/em><\/strong> , in form<\/em><\/strong> I think is the Armenian word Vorskan<\/em><\/strong> = Hunter.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 Thus, \u0569\u0083\u0549\u0080\u0093zcan Alper\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\"\"<\/a>\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0is the Turkicized Armenian Vorskan Akhper<\/strong> = Hunter-Brother<\/em><\/strong>, which is an extremely ancient character preserved in Armenian folklore, as a linguistic fossil denoting the pre-historical times of hunter-gatherers roaming the lands of Armenian Anatolian Highlands<\/em><\/strong>.\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

Armenian communities throughout the world should make an urgent effort to see this most beautiful, politically powerful, educationally visceral, aesthetically sensational great film in local cinemas \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009c For all enquires to organize a local \/community showing, see\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0 Contact below;\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n

Contact<\/strong><\/p>\n

Cafera\u0569\u0084\u056a\u0534a Mah. Sarraf Ali Sok.
\nKaan Apt. No:25 \/ 3
\nKad\u0569\u0084\u0539\u055ek\u0569\u0083\u0539\u0533y \/ \u0569\u0084\u0539\u055bST \/ TR<\/p>\n

T<\/strong> (+90) 216 418 42 06
\nF<\/strong> (+90) 216 336 26 34
\nE<\/strong> info@narfilm.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Film-Review; Gelecek Uzun S\u0569\u0085\u0539\u055erer (2011\/Turkey)\/ The Future Lasts Forever, Written and directed by \u0569\u0085\u0539\u0090zcan Alper British Gala Night; 24th January, 2011, 7.30 pm. at the Cineworld, Wood Green, London. Someone high-up at the Turkish Ministry […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9123,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_kadence_starter_templates_imported_post":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,10,7],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aaeurop.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9114"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aaeurop.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aaeurop.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aaeurop.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aaeurop.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9114"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.aaeurop.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9114\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9124,"href":"https:\/\/www.aaeurop.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9114\/revisions\/9124"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aaeurop.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/9123"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aaeurop.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9114"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aaeurop.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9114"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aaeurop.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9114"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}