"TURKEY: KURDISH FILMMAKERS WRESTLE WITH THE FUTURE
10/30/09
For Kurds, a nation without a state, artistic expression in recent decades has tended to have a strong political flavor. Now, however, some Kurdish filmmakers are attempting to break out of the old mold.
The trends, old and new, were on display at the inaugural New York Kurdish Film Festival, held on October 21-25. The lineup included eight feature films, a documentary, and 10 shorts. The focal point of the festival was three works with political themes; Yol, or The Path, which won Cannes Film Festival’s Palm D’Or in 1982 for its portrayal of Turkey after the 1980 military coup; The Storm, directed by the Turkish Kurdish Kazeem Öz, portrayed a group of students who become involved in the Kurdish uprising in the 1990’s; and Yuksel Yavuz’s documentary Close Up Kurdistan, a personal account of the filmmaker’s own return to Turkey from Germany."
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