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Distant

2002, Movie, NR, 110 mins

Distant: Review

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Winner of the 2003 Cannes Film Festival's Grand Prix, Turkish director Nuri Bilge Ceylan skims along on a deceptively placid surface. Under this quiet, however, roil currents of guilt, familial obligations and abandonment. The film's title refers to both the relationship between jaded city dweller Mahmut (Muzaffer Ozdemir) and his distant relative, Yusuf (Mehmet Emin Toprak), and the connection Mahmut carefully maintains with the world around him. Years earlier, Mahmut arrived in Istanbul a penniless idealist, his heart filled with dreams of making films in the manner of Tarkovsky. A more disillusioned Mahmut now makes a very comfortable living as a commercial photographer for a tile manufacturer. Once married, Mahmut now lives alone and avoids contact with the people to whom he was once close. He screens his mother's calls and spends most of his free time watching TV or eating in cafés, always by himself. Into this isolated world steps Yusuf, an unemployed factory worker who hails from the same small town as Mahmut but has come to Istanbul under more desperate circumstances. The economic crisis gripping Turkey has reached his tiny town, forcing the local factory to lay off 1000 workers, including Yusuf and his father. Yusuf hopes to find work on a freighter while staying with Mahmut, but jobs are scarce in the city as well, and it's clear from the outset that Mahmut has no interest in Yusuf's plight and won't lift a finger to help him. It's also apparent that Mahmut finds his country cousin an unpalatable roommate: He can't bear the odor emanating from Yusuf's shoes and finds his personal habits slovenly at best. But his aversion runs deeper than that, and when his ever-increasing impatience finally explodes into outright rage, it becomes clear that his disgust has less to do with Yusuf than with himself. Mahmut isn't the only artist enamored of Tarkovsky's technique: Ceylan's film comprises a series of long takes, often in medium to long shot, and their meaning gradually seeps through over time. There's also very little dialogue, but what there is is often very funny, and Ceylan is a master of the dead-pan visual gags that reveal volumes about his character. After Yusuf calls it a night after fidgeting through half of STALKER, Mahmut, the great Tarkovsky lover, pops in a porno. Ozdemir and Toprak, the director's cousin, shared the Best Actor Award at Cannes, and are equally superb. leave a comment --Ken Fox
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