The Wild Pear Tree (2018)
(Ahlat Agaci)
Country: TUR/NMAC/FR/GER/BOS/BUL/SV/QAT
Technical: col/2.39:1 188m
Director: Nuri Bilge Ceylan
Cast: Dogu Demirkol, Murat Cemcir, Bennu Yildirimlar, Hazar Ergüçlü
Synopsis:
A schoolteacher's son returns from his studies but finds it hard to reinsert into the life of the small town. What awaits him? Become a teacher like his father, whom he despises for his gambling addiction, or drift on the dream that his book will sell and make him a writer?
Review:
Harking back to the small town setting, and ambivalent feelings, of his first two features, Ceylan's mature masterpiece is a long, slow unpicking of the young man's many prejudices, intellectual pride and intolerances, set to the oscillations of Bach's Passacaglia in C minor. Sinan must learn to accept his father and love him for what he is, which means accepting his own vices. It's so simple, but Ceylan orchestrates the process over a series of widely spaced discussions in which Sinan pits himself, Job-like, against the rest of the world: an old flame, a putative backer, an established writer, a pair of Imams, his mother. Gradually his shoulders sag and his slouch grows ever more desultory until he takes the first determined step towards penance. A beautiful film which demands patience but is never dull, as it tries to make sense of the big ideas - time, faith, moral responsibility - while bringing everything back to a field with a shack, and a well that may or may not one day produce water.
(Ahlat Agaci)
Country: TUR/NMAC/FR/GER/BOS/BUL/SV/QAT
Technical: col/2.39:1 188m
Director: Nuri Bilge Ceylan
Cast: Dogu Demirkol, Murat Cemcir, Bennu Yildirimlar, Hazar Ergüçlü
Synopsis:
A schoolteacher's son returns from his studies but finds it hard to reinsert into the life of the small town. What awaits him? Become a teacher like his father, whom he despises for his gambling addiction, or drift on the dream that his book will sell and make him a writer?
Review:
Harking back to the small town setting, and ambivalent feelings, of his first two features, Ceylan's mature masterpiece is a long, slow unpicking of the young man's many prejudices, intellectual pride and intolerances, set to the oscillations of Bach's Passacaglia in C minor. Sinan must learn to accept his father and love him for what he is, which means accepting his own vices. It's so simple, but Ceylan orchestrates the process over a series of widely spaced discussions in which Sinan pits himself, Job-like, against the rest of the world: an old flame, a putative backer, an established writer, a pair of Imams, his mother. Gradually his shoulders sag and his slouch grows ever more desultory until he takes the first determined step towards penance. A beautiful film which demands patience but is never dull, as it tries to make sense of the big ideas - time, faith, moral responsibility - while bringing everything back to a field with a shack, and a well that may or may not one day produce water.
(Ahlat Agaci)
Country: TUR/NMAC/FR/GER/BOS/BUL/SV/QAT
Technical: col/2.39:1 188m
Director: Nuri Bilge Ceylan
Cast: Dogu Demirkol, Murat Cemcir, Bennu Yildirimlar, Hazar Ergüçlü
Synopsis:
A schoolteacher's son returns from his studies but finds it hard to reinsert into the life of the small town. What awaits him? Become a teacher like his father, whom he despises for his gambling addiction, or drift on the dream that his book will sell and make him a writer?
Review:
Harking back to the small town setting, and ambivalent feelings, of his first two features, Ceylan's mature masterpiece is a long, slow unpicking of the young man's many prejudices, intellectual pride and intolerances, set to the oscillations of Bach's Passacaglia in C minor. Sinan must learn to accept his father and love him for what he is, which means accepting his own vices. It's so simple, but Ceylan orchestrates the process over a series of widely spaced discussions in which Sinan pits himself, Job-like, against the rest of the world: an old flame, a putative backer, an established writer, a pair of Imams, his mother. Gradually his shoulders sag and his slouch grows ever more desultory until he takes the first determined step towards penance. A beautiful film which demands patience but is never dull, as it tries to make sense of the big ideas - time, faith, moral responsibility - while bringing everything back to a field with a shack, and a well that may or may not one day produce water.