Discoveries from Turkey World Cinema

Tarot connects two girls as the line between reality and delusion blurs.

Halit is an old retired man, who lives in a small village in Turkey. His life is planned around his phone calls with his son every Thursday who is making the military service.

Karagöz, who is going through difficult times due to poverty, reflects this problem in his home life. As a result, he argues with his wife and decides to rent out his house. Unable to escape his problems, Karagöz deceives Tuzsuz by following Hacivat's advice. However, this causes him to experience even more serious problems. Right in the midst of this chaos, Karagöz's wife plays a game to take revenge on him. Will Karagöz be able to escape the situation he has found himself in?

Birdmen of Istanbul In Istanbul, aviculture evolved from hunting raptors in Ottoman times to songbird enthusiasts in the late 19th century, mainly among Greek and Armenian minorities. Today, a few residents maintain this tradition as a cultural testament.

Mr. Cemal made every sacrifice for his three sons' education and worked tirelessly day and night to ensure that his children would have good careers. In the end, his efforts were not in vain, and all three sons had respectable professions. However, Mr. Cemal, who had endured many hardships for his three sons, was left alone as they moved to different provinces for work.

In this Stand up show Ali Congun calls "City Elite", ironically deals with the urbanization efforts of the townspeople, who had to move to the city, sometimes with desperation and sometimes with cunning, while on the other hand, he also enjoys, along with his audience, occasionally sarcastically criticizing the provincial behavior of some elites who define themselves as urbanites, which are embedded in their codes.

A documentary film about Bursa city.

Another burst of laughter from the great comedy master Nejat Uygur. Two very old friends meet years later. One of them belongs to a wealthy and noble family with a lineage dating back to the old Ottoman palace. The other is an ordinary man of the people. The events that started with the sale of the mansion belonging to the family of the noble friend, develop in a funny way with Nejat Uygur's usual sense of humor.

Motion in a surreal world; this world is not chaotic, it's a simple environment and nothing is static.

Amina is a 29-year-old Senegalese woman who works as a dress model in a textile company in Istanbul. Leaving her daughter behind, she immigrated to Turkey seven years ago to earn money and to take care of her daughter’s needs. Amina faces many challenges each day as an African woman living in Turkey. She fights these difficulties keeping alive her hopes of going back to her daughter and her country, she also dreams of being a real model one day. As an immigrant, Amina is in two minds-between her realities and her dreams.

Man cuts off his arm and is invited to a "church".

A married woman finds herself being blackmailed by her forbidden lover's ex-girlfriend. This cat-and-mouse game plunges the woman into fear and anxiety.

The film depicts the story of an ex-con, who struggles to hold on the life after his release from prison.

Yasemin and Mustafa, who belong to different religions, are a happy couple who live without worrying about their religious differences. Their quiet life in Izmir is turned upside down one night when Yasemin has a terrible nightmare. The paranormal events that follow immediately after the nightmare begin to affect Yasemin's psychology. However, Mustafa takes his wife's experiences lightly. Yasemin goes to the church as a last resort and asks the priest for help, but she cannot find a solution. Finally, they turn to a teacher named Mansur Hoca, who tells Yasemin that she is being haunted by a very dangerous tribe of jinn.

A woman meanders through the streets of Istanbul five years after the military coup. Something is amiss, and the air is filled with a strangeness that seems to plague everyone. Friendship, conversation, boredom, wonder and hopelessness lead the woman to head to the island in the hope of change. What is left after all these?

The second film of the Pandemic Trilogy, “Why Am I Still Here Then?” is a sequel to 61 Street No 4, and it makes the audience experience the unconscious reflection of the Other who entered in the previous film. The monologues throughout the film emphasize the character's feeling of being stuck and her confrontation with the unconscious. As a result of the confrontation, the audience is left with a mind ready to be completely liberated. Experimental narrative, creative montage and sound design come to the forefront in “Why Am I Still Here Then?”, and it narrates us understanding and accepting our unconscious.

Eylem Kaftan is preparing for a 1400 km journey to South Eastern Turkey. Armed with only a few contacts, a faded family photograph and a passionate urge to discover the truth, the filmmaker will to attempt to unravel the 30-year-old mystery of her aunt’s murder.

"The Ballad of the Wood" reveals the traditional architecture of the houses of the Western Black Sea region for centuries has been passed down from father to son, from master to apprentice through secrets and a technique known as "canti". Some of the houses shown have been standing for the last 100 to 150 years. The film honors the great craftsman of the past who utilized the "dizeme" technique through an emphasis on structures that are 300 years old. These examples are some of the most unique to be found in the Western Black Sea region. This craft has been passed down from generation to generation. Now only a few old and tired practitioners are left and they reveal to the camera their anti-earthquake construction techniques. The average age of the craftsmen is 80 years old.

A group of friends trying to write their new books decide to visit an abandoned, old village for story research. Unaware of what lies ahead, the group settles into a hotel and sets out to explore the village for research. For them, the door to darkness has now opened. The village they visit is a village cursed by Alkarısı.

Three brothers take their father’s body from the 7th floor to the ground floor with the help of a funeral director.

This is the story of Muhammed Faris, the first Syrian to go to outer space. He is forced to flee his country, as his ideas for a free Syria make him a target.

Menderes is living with his bedridden brother called Adnan in Kirazli, Kusadasi. Menderes commits his life to look after his brother. The real estate dealer Resit is a very sly man who is trying to convince Menderes for selling his family home and finding a nursing home for his brother.

Julie is a young French woman, whose father is of Syrian descent Christian Arab from Mardin, east of Turkey When her beloved father passes she discovers that she has an aunt whose existence is hidden from her. The last wish of her aunt, a victim of her father's fault in the past, is to buried in Syria. Juile is ready to do anything.

A cramped elevator, a raccoon and his Bitcoin. Among the flamingos, a raccoon who lost his Bitcoin in the chaos goes after the flamingos.

The story begins in a mental hospital and continues with Tahsin and Rıfat lying to the doctor that they are well and leaving the hospital. As soon as they leave the hospital, the two go to Rıfat's mother's house to surprise her. However, when they arrive home, they learn that the neighborhood is undergoing urban renewal and that, like everyone else, their mother has sold her house.

The film centers on the topics of cyber warfare and cyber activism, which have not been previously addressed in Turkish cinema. Claiming to comprehensively address its subject matter with contributions from numerous experts, the film 'Red!' does not shy away from examining RedHack—undoubtedly the most prominent group in Turkey when it comes to cyber activism—and its actions from different angles.

Revolutionaries passed before the streets of the 1960s on the road to democracy. Then the youth with the victory songs, the workers with the rebel flags, the rightists, the leftists and the putschists again. The country spent 12 years in the grip of the revolution and in the end all roads came to the same crossroads. Ankara was restless in the minutes when the ousted prime minister of the Democratic Party, Adnan Menderes, was hanged. The news of Menderes' execution had not yet come. There was an anxious wait in the houses. Ears were on the radio. Everyone was wondering what happened in Imrali. In the Assembly, the National Unity Committee was in a meeting. They were also trying to learn the fate of Menderes. Suddenly, news came that EP Chairperson Ragıp Gümüşpala and Secretary General Şinasi Osman wanted to meet with the committee urgently. The committee members did not break the request of their former commander Gümüşpala and made an appointment for 14:30...

An experimental short film that lets you witness an artists work process with one small catch; because of the constant chase of perfection we won't even know what the artist intended to create at the first place...

A story of key-cutter, who has the second sight with the touch of his fingers on any key he receives to copy, and also when his young nephew Selim has one made he is deeply troubled and warns not only Selim but shares his thoughts with the family. The film, freshly out of Cemal Yildirim's camera, the director, is based on the book 'Autumn' written by Ferhat Atik after a true story, a crime, happening in Cyprus in the 70s.

After a subway malfunction forces "W", a dystopian office worker, out of her digital illusion, she discovers a vibrant, hidden world, realizing that escaping the system's apathy might be harder than finding the truth.

A film about migration, otherness, and the fragile possibility of living together. In Istanbul’s Aksaray district, traces of distant geographies collide — Syria, Somalia, East Turkestan, Kazakhstan. At the heart of this convergence is Yeni Han, where translated documents mirror transformed lives. It’s a place of hope and confusion, of shifting identities and uncertain futures. Meanwhile, just outside, locals and newcomers share the same streets yet remain separated by invisible distances. This film listens to the silence between them — the hesitation, fear, and unspoken boundaries that shape coexistence in today’s Istanbul.

Necla and Cemal, trying to go from their village to the city center, find themselves in a stranger’s car. Suspicion brews as the driver, Hidayet, probes the two’s guarded silence, sensing hidden truths. This never ending journey does not end in peace, Necla an Cemal will be able to find some peace of mind.

A personal journey into the kaleidoscopic history of a “place of salvation, Bakırköy. Berkay Şatır uses his own memories and neighborhood to draw the spectator into a musical growth by looking at the changing texture of a musical identity with unique archival footage and photos from 90’s and 2000’s.

A young girl in a deep void, her new roommate, and a mysterious voice coming from the depths of the internet, the media of the moment. Melike, who has just emerged from a long-term relationship, discovers a new power within herself as she encounters new people in her life. But this power becomes her greatest dilemma. A story dominated by magic and the Deep Web. After this story, only one question will remain in your mind: Is the Deep Web or is it the Antichrist himself?

Eight-year-old Evlin characterizes the resilience of Kobane's resistance against ISIS forces through her experience in a refugee camp on the Turkish-Syrian border.

The film follows The Director, a young and talented storyteller who starts to hear sounds from a reality that is not his own.

Blind singer Yüksel is expecting some respectable customers, however the best musicians of the town are engaged to leave to another city for a folk dance competition, therefore Yüksel needs to locate new musicians. Hairdresser Kazım, takes photographs of people who resemble the characters in the novel Snow by Orhan Pamuk as well as streets and objects to print as postcards, but he has a hard time convincing the towns people who are not fond of the novel which is set in Kars. Three imaginary musicians, two apprentices and a child chasing a goose accompanies the searching of these two protagonists.

A sick musician comes across a homeless boy at the traffic lights. Decides to make a change in his and the boys life.

The story is about the soul-searching of those people leading small lives, searching for little happiness, only to fall into big predicaments. Based upon the logic of "winning-and-losing", these soul-searchings are directed towards their loved ones, towards life in general but, most importantly, towards themselves. Needless to say, as usual, it is a woman who suffers most within these patriarchal soul-searchings.

Shavkat, a pizza courier, and his girlfriend Fatima are illegal migrants in a new land. When they crash their motorcycle while on delivery, Shavkat fears deportation and flees the scene.

The dance of nature, sound and time around an old man.