Güneşe Yolculuk

Journey to the Sun

Unerwartete tagespolitische Aktualität bekam Ustaoğlus Film Güneşe Yolculuk. Ein stiller, von den Kritikern gemochter Film über einen Türken und einen Kurden, der zur Versöhnung aufrief, ohne dabei weltfremd zu wirken. Kurdische Demonstranten nutzten die Premiere, um auf die Repressionen gegen ihr Volk und ihre Kultur aufmerksam zu machen. Sie forderten die Freilassung ihres in der Türkei inhaftierten Führers Abdullah Öcalan. Die Proteste eskalierten und hatten unter anderem die Besetzung des griechischen Konsulats zur Folge. Ein Zwischenfall, der „die Vorführung dieses unaufdringlichen Porträts einer sterbenden Kultur unnötig belastete“, konstatierte Wolfgang Jacobsen in „50 Jahre Berlinale“, übersah dabei aber offenbar, dass es ja gerade das „stille“ Sterben ihrer Kultur war, das die verzweifelte Wut der Demonstranten geschürt hatte. (Berlin International Film Festival)

Mehmet, a recent arrival to the teeming city, is fortunate. He has a shared room, a possible girlfriend, and a neat job as a diviner for Istanbul’s municipal water system. He meets Berzan, a street music vendor familiar with the metropolis, and his moral education begins. Berzan is a Kurd, harassed by the authorities, and Mehmet’s friendship with him combined with his own “dark skin” puts Mehmet at extreme risk. Yeşim Ustaoğlu, an architect turned filmmaker, takes her characters on a journey east out of Istanbul into a ravishing and war-ravaged landscape close to the Iraqi border. Hotly debated when first released in Turkey, Journey to the Sun may be a story of sanctioned persecution, but it is also the chronicle of a remarkable friendship as well as a pilgrimage into the unknown. (Film Society of Lincoln Center) Yeşim Ustaoğlu’s sophomore feature Journey to the Sun received the Blue Angel Award at the Berlin International Film Festival in 1999.

Director's Biography
YEŞIM USTAOĞLU, born in 1960, is an award-winning director from Çaykara, Turkey. She directed several shorts before making her feature film debut with The Trace in 1994. She received international recognition for her 1999 film Journey to the Sun, winning several international awards. // Films (selection): İz (The Trace, 1994), Güneşe Yolculuk (Journey to the Sun, 1999), Bulutlari Beklerken (Waiting for the Clouds, 2004), Pandora’nin Kutusu (Pandora’s Box, 2008; CE’09), Araf (Araf – Somewhere in Between, 2012; CE’13), Tereddüt (Clair Obscur, 2016)
Spotlight 2017
Yeşim Ustaoğlu
Türkei / Deutschland / Niederlande 1999
Color
104 Minuten
OmeU
Drehbuch Yeşim Ustaoğlu
Kamera Reyhan Yılmaz
Schnitt Nicolas Gaster
Ton/Sounddesign Svetolik Mica Zajs, Christian Gotz, Frederic Helm, Bruno Tarriére
Musik Vlatko Stefanovski
Mit Nevruz Baz, Nazmi Kırık, Mizgin Kapazan, Ara Güler, Berceste Akgün, Kazım Ekinci, Nigar Aktar Şirvan
Produzent*innen Behrooz Hashemian (Silkroad Production, FR), İstisnai Filmler ve Reklamlar (TR), Medias Res Berlin Film- und Fernsehproduktion (DE), Filmcompany Amsterdam (NL)
Produktion
Silkroad Production 8 rue Myrha 75018 Paris France info@silkroadproduction.com www.silkroadproduction.com
Weltpremiere / World Premiere
Berlin International Film Festival 1999