Fatih Akin

Born in Hamburg to Turkish parents, Fatih Akin has taken Istanbul to his heart like a native. The title of this film refers to the fact that the city, placed at the point where Asia and Europe meet, has always been as open to the East as it is to the West. It features German musician Alexander Hacke (member of Einstürzende Neubauten) as the narrator. Hacke and Akın travelled around Istanbul with a mobile recording studio and a microphone, assembling an inspired portrait of Turkish music:  Baba Zula, Orient Expressions, Mercan Dede, Sezen Aksu . . .

♦ ◊  ⇒ Crossing The Bridge –  The Sound Of Istanbul  ⇐ (2005)

•  Soundtrack

1. «Music» – Sertab Erener (5:18)
2. «Tavus Havası» – Baba Zula (5:27)
3. «İstanbul 1:26 A.M.» – Orient Expressions (6:36)
4. «İstanbul» – Duman (1:40)
5. «Şahar Dağı» – Replikas (7:08)
6. «Holocaust» – Ceza (3:28)
7. «AB-I Hayat» – Mercan Dede (3:47)
8. «Kürdili Hicazkar Longa» – Selim Sesler (4:58)
9. «Wedding Song» – The Wedding Sound System (2:04)
10. «Penceresi Yola Karşı» – Selim Sesler & Brenna MacCrimmon (2:54)
11. «Hayyam» – Siya Siyabend (2:49)
12. «Böyle Olur Mu» – Nur Ceylan (1:34)
13. «Ehmedo» – Aynur Doğan (5:26)
14. «Hatasız Kul Olmaz» – Orhan Gencebay (5:24)
15. «Haydar Haydar» – Müzeyyen Senar (1:19)
16. «İstanbul Hatırası» – Sezen Aksu (4:38)
17. «Cecom» – Baba Zula (4:35)
18. «Music (Radyo Versyonu)» – Sertab Erener (3:47)

¤   Trailers  . . .

♦  In the Fade (Aus dem Nichts)  ⇓  [2017]

♦  Tschick  ⇓  «Goodbye Berlin»  (2016)

•→   The Cut   ⇐  [2014]

Mardin, 1915: one night, the Turkish police round up all the Armenian men in the city, including the young blacksmith, Nazaret Manoogian, who is separated from his family. Years later, after managing to survive the horrors of the genocide, he hears that his two daugthers are also still alive. He becomes fixated on the idea of finding them and sets off to track them down. His search takes him from the Mesopotamian deserts and Havana to the barren and desolate prairies of North Dakota. On this odyssey, he encounters a range of very different people: angelic and kind-hearted characters, but also the devil incarnate.

•→Fatih Akin Discusses His New Film ‘The Cut’⇐

♦   Polluting Paradise  ⇓  [2012]

Among the green hills beside the Black Sea in north-eastern Turkey lies a vast open air garbage dump; tons and tons of rubbish, syringes, animal carcasses, a sickening stench, with stray animals gorging themselves on the waste.

This place is Çamburnu, the village where Fatih Akin’s grandparents were born. It was a little piece of paradise when the film-maker first went to visit in 2005. But even as he was falling in love with the site, deciding to shoot the final scene of On the Other Side of Heaven there, he learnt that the state was intending to build a garbage dump just next door. He started to film, thinking “naively” that this would deter the planners. But the construction went ahead under the eye of his camera. Fatih Akin continued to film, without for a single instant imagining that he was getting into a project that would last five years. He ended up recording the construction of the dump as it advanced side by side with the struggle of the mayor and his residents. It was a long-haul project made possible by local colleagues, in particular Bünyamin Seyrekbasan, a photographer in the village, who filmed the combat on a day-by-day basis and who is one of the characters in the movie.

♦   Min dît – Zarokên Amed – The Children of Amed (Diyarbakir)  ⇓  [2010]

Ten-year old Gulistan and her younger brother Firat live happily with their parents in Amed (Diyarbakir), the heart of Northern-Kurdistan. Tragedy strikes when their mother and father (political journalist) are shot down by paramilitary gunmen before their eyes. Traumatised and orphaned, Gulistan, Firat and their infant sister are placed in the care of their young, politically-active aunt Yekbun who soon disappears without a trace. As days turn into weeks, the money that their aunt left them runs out. Eventually, the children have to fend for themselves on the streets, where one day, Gulistan is shocked to come across the murderer of her parents.

♦→  Soul Kitchen  ⇓  [2009]

A low-budget restaurateur finds himself in a big vat of trouble in this comedy from director Fatih Akin. Zinos Kazantsakis (Adam Bousdoukos) runs a cheap restaurant in a run-down warehouse distract that he calls the Soul Kitchen. While the food isn’t very good, it doesn’t cost much and a regular clientele shows up each evening for cheap beer, filling food, and the company of their peers. Bad luck follows Zinos like a shadow, and when his girlfriend, Nadine (Pheline Roggan), runs off to China, he decides to follow, putting his brother (Moritz Bleibtreu) in charge of the restaurant. However, his brother is a convicted criminal, and before long the city’s underworld has taken over the place and tax collectors are threatening to shut them down. Zinos returns after Nadine pledges her heart to another, and discovers his diner is a shambles; hoping to put the Soul Kitchen back on its feet, Zinos hires a flashy gourmet chef (Birol Unel) to revamp the menu, but soon he’s alienated his old customers while new ones haven’t taken their place.

•→ «New York, I Love You» ⇐An anthology film joining several love stories set in NY  [trailer_2008]

♦  The Edge of Heaven  ↓  [2007]

A Turkish man travels to Istanbul to find the daughter of his father’s former girlfriend.

♦  KEBAB CONNECTION  ↓  [2005]

Ibo, a chaotic but creative Turk from the Hamburg “hood”, idolizes Bruce Lee and wants to go down in history as the maker of the first German kung fu film. Since his ambition is rivalled only by his lack of experience, he has to begin on a small scale. He makes a commercial spot for his uncle Ahmet’s floundering döner joint, all the while trying to prove his skill at making martial arts films. His uncle hates the spot, but it is a huge success. The King of Kebab overflows with customers and Ibo is celebrated as the new Spielberg.

♦  Head-On  ↓  Gegen die Wand  [2004]

40-year-old Cahit is brought to German psychiatric clinic after attempting suicide and sets out to start a new life, even as he longs for drugs and alcohol to numb his pain. Sibel is young, pretty and, like Cahit, Turkish-German. She lives a lifestyle that is a bit too wild for her devout, conservative Muslim family and fakes a suicide attempt to try and escape them. But the incident brings shame upon her family, who insist that only marriage can save her. Sibel begs Cahit to marry her and he reluctantly agrees, perhaps in an effort to save her and to find meaning in his own life.

♦  Im Juli  ⇓  (2000 _ clip)

A man who has never been lucky in love thinks his fortune may have changed, only to find his life becoming all the more complicated in this nomadic romantic comedy. Daniel (Moritz Blebitreu) is a shy schoolteacher who is often unsure around women, but when he meets Melek (Idil Under), a beautiful Turkish woman, he falls head over heels in love and agrees to meet up with her in Istanbul. However, while en route from Hamburg, Daniel spots Juli (Christiane Paul), a woman he knows, trying to hitch a ride. Daniel picks her up, seemingly oblivious to the fact that she’s long carried a torch for him; when Juli discovers why Daniel is making a long trip through Central Europe, she figures this could be her last chance to win him over. Her attempts to win his affections lead to a number of arguments, reconciliations, unintended turns, and brushes with the wrong side of the law.

♦  Kurz und Schmerzlos  ⇓  (Main Title _ 1998)

Hamburg, Germany. The small crime scene. Three friends: Gabriel from Turkey and just out of prison, Costa from Greece and together with Gabriel’s sister, Bobby from Serbia and together with her best friend. Bobby wants to get more into organized crime and decides to apply for a membership in an Albanian gang. As a test, he has to beat up someone who owes his future boss. He can join. Later, when Bobby has to do a weapon’s deal on his own, he tries to get his friends in, too. But Gabriel does not want to go back into crime, he is dreaming of a life at the southern Turkish coast, owning a boat rental shop. Costa, always out of money, joins Bobby for one last time before getting good. But before the deal is on, both women start leaving their men for others. And when the deal is on, it goes terribly wrong.