Times and Winds (15)

A remarkable, cinematic poem that captures the turning point between childhood and adult life in a remote mountain village

Director: Reha Erdem
Starring: Ozakan Ozen, Ali Bey Kayali, Elit Iscan, Bulent Emin Yarar
Turkey, 2006, 1 hour 52 minutes, subtitles

Wed 3 March 8.00pm Bishops Castle Film Society, The Three Tuns

Divided into five discrete chapters to reflect the changing textures of the Muslim day, punctuated by five calls to prayer, this is a beautifully photographed, pastoral portrait of the life, rhythms and seasons of a remote mountain village. It reflects Turkey's precipitous situation - at a crossroads between Asia and Europe, tradition and modernity, secularism and religion. This is mirrored in the lives of its three pubescent protagonists poised between the freedom of childhood and the strictures of adult life. We experience the hardships and joys of rural life through their variously troubled and subtly handled rites of passage. An intriguing and truly original film.