71th Cannes Film Festival Turkish Pavilion
Organization of the Turkey Desk of the European Film Market which will be formed during the 71th Cannes Film Festival that will take place between 8-19 May 2018 was assigned to the International Bosphorus Cinema Association by the Turkish Ministry of Culture and Tourism.
For promotion of the Turkish cinema, our desk prepared a catalogue comprised of feature films, a catalogue comprised of short films and documentaries, a catalogue including details of the film festivals organized in and the production companies operating in Turkey, as well as a collection comprised of short films.
Various meetings were organized in order to share information with the producers, directors, distributors, festival managers, cinema operators, representatives of international cinema associations, screen writers and other people from similar fields who want to get information about Turkish cinema and Turkey.
In this year’s main contest under the Cannes Film Festival, Turkey is represented by Nuri Bilge Ceylan’s most recent film, Ahlat Ağacı (The Wild Pear Tree). This year, the chairman of the jury of the main contest -in which Ceylan will be competing for the Golden Palm- will be the famous actress Cate Blanchett. Among the 21 films competing in the main contest, there are also the most recent films of directors such as Jean Luc Godard, Asghar Farhadi, Matteo Garrone and Spike Lee. The premiere of the film ‘Ahlat Ağacı (The Wild Pear Tree)’ which will take place in scope of the festival on 18 May at Palais de Festival, with the participation of Nuri Bilge Ceylan and the cast. The winner of the Golden Globe, which is accepted as the most prestigious award in the world, will receive the award in the award ceremony to be held on 19 May.
In the film under which Doğu Demirkol and Murat Cemcir share the leading role, Ahmet Rıfat Şungar, Hazar Ergüçlü, Tamer Levent, Kadir Çermikli, Kubilay Tunçer and Ercüment Balakoğlu accompany these two names.
The film ‘Ahlat Ağacı (The Wild Pear Tree) tells the story of an author who faces the burden of his father’s debts after returning to his village many years later, and focuses on both father-son and family relationships. The screenplay of the film was written together by Akın Aksu, Ebru Ceylan and Nuri Bilge Ceylan, and the cinematography was undertaken by Gökhan Tiryaki – who Ceylan formerly has worked together in various films.
Turkey will be represented by director Can Evrenol’s project called Perihan:Girl With No Mouth in the Proof of Concept division of Frontieres which aims the genre films to find finance and project development, and which will take place for the second time this year together with Fantasia Film Festival and the Market division of Cannes Film Festival . The project’s first international presentation will take place on 12 May and will target film professionals, distributors and producers.