Turkey and Greece unite on screen

The recent collaborations between Greek and Turkish filmmakers are an increasing interest on the part of Turkish moviegoers in cinema. This year’s edition of Documentarist, devotes a section to Greek - Turkish relations.

Celebrating its fifth year, Documentarist, Istanbul’s Documentary Days, is preparing to bring moviegoers face to face with the harsh realities of today (and yesterday) as seen through the eyes of nearly 100 filmmakers. This year’s festival, taking place between June 1-6, features a section devoted to Greece and the difficult times it has experienced in the last couple of years.

The section “Our Nextdoor Neighbor Greece” is the latest example in a string of collaborations between Turkey and Greece, as well as a growing interest in each other’s work both in film and TV. The sometimes-troubled relationship between the neighbors seems to have taken a friendly turn in the past couple of years, at least as seen through the camera.

In this year’s Documentarist, one can see examples from Greek cinema that shed a harsh light on the tough times of the recent past. Myrna Tsapa’s Katinoula of 2012 is a candid look at an elderly woman of Greek origin living in Egypt. Directors Chyrysa Tzelepi and Tania Hatzigeorgiou’s film, 25th Meridien, which took five years to complete, follows the lives of the few remaining Greek residents on the largest Turkish island in the Aegean, Gökçeada, or Imbros.

Click here for full article (Hürriyet Daily News)

Harry Potter'la yine yeniden

Yedi kitap ve sekiz filmle macerasını tamamladığını sandığımız Harry Potter, popüler kültüre bir türlü veda edemeyecek gibi gözüküyor. Yeni sesli ve elektronik kitaplar, J.K. Rowling’in heyecanla duyurduğu web sitesi Pottermore, ufukta beliren bir ansiklopedi ve ilk defa hayranlara açılan filmlerin çekildiği stüdyo, büyücüler ve cadılar dünyasında kazan hala kaynıyor diyor...

Harry Potter serisinin yedinci ve son kitabının piyasaya çıktığı 2007 yazı dünyanın dört bir köşesine dağılmış milyonlarca hayran için de buruk bir yazdı. On yıl önce tanıdığımız küçük büyücü ve cadıların tedirgin yetişkinlere dönüştüğü, masum maceraların epik bir savaşla noktalandığı, popüler kültürün bir kahramanına veda ettiği bir yaz.

İki yakasını bir araya getiremeyen yalnız bir anneyken 2000’lerin başında dünyanın en zengin kadınlarından birisi olan J.K. Rowling’in hayranlarıyla yaşadığı ilişkinin de karmaşıklaştığı bir dönemdi son kitabın piyasaya çıktığı yaz. Harry Potter’ın yaşayıp yaşamayacağına emin olamayan hayranlar dünya çapında başlattıkları Harry’yi Kurtar kampanyasıyla sevgili kahramanlarının popüler kültür mezarlığına gitmemesi için ellerinden geleni yaptılar.

Rowling de güvenli yolu seçti ve Harry Potter ve Ölüm Yadigarları’nın son bölümünde serinin saç ayağı Harry, Ron ve Hermione’nin büyümüş hallerini okuyuculara sundu. Bu edebi manevrayla gelecekte ne olursa olsun, Harry Potter ve arkadaşlarına bir şey olmayacağını garantiliyordu. Hayatının o döneminde büyücüler dünyasıyla artık işi kalmadığını düşünse de, aynı dünyaya yeniden atlama olasılığını baki tutuyordu. Hatta kahramanlarını çoluk çocuklu çekirdek ailelere dönüştürerek, yeni nesil büyücü ve cadılar için de açık bir kapı bırakmıştı Rowling.

Yazının devamı için tıklayın (Akşam Cumartesi)

Chatting with UK's Paralympic swimmer Rodgers

The UK’s Paralympic swimmer Susannah Rodgers talks about being a newcomer to international competitions, being selected for London 2012, her sporting idols, and Paralympics.

Susannah Rodgers is a Paralympic swimmer for the British team in the Olympic Games. She won five golds and one silver on her international debut at the 2011 IPC European Championships in Berlin and set two European records. She had also won bronze and silver at the 2011 British Championships. She is currently ranked third in the world for the 50m freestyle. The London-based swimmer is also working for the British Council. Here is an interview with Susannah Rodgers.

You are a relatively newcomer in the international competitions. When did you start swimming competitively?

I did do some swimming when I went to university when I was 21. I did training for a year and I competed. But I was doing a degree in Modern Languages, and as part of my degree I had to go and travel abroad for a year. So I stopped swimming. And it was only after I’d finished university that I got back to the swimming, and I got started competing again. And it went well and then it carried on from there.

Click here for full article (British Council Blog)

‘The Dictator’: When racist replaces racy

Once one of the best comedians in the world and a crusader fighting the ignorance, prejudice and vacuousness of political correctness, Sacha Baron Cohen has given in to Hollywood mechanics. ‘The Dictator’ is at best a mediocre comedy

When Borat Sagdiyev, Kazakhstan’s sixth best journalist and one of the many alteregos of British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen, led the unsuspecting American patrons of a Country West Club to sing along to Throw the Jew Down the Well on screen in 2006, it was time to revisit the boundaries of comedy, and realize that we actually live in a very controlled environment when it comes to humor.

Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan was a mockumentary, a collection of pranks spread over a journey from New York to California. Borat and his producer traveled throughout the “U.S. and A,” to make a documentary on America or to find Pamela Anderson and make her Borat’s wife, whichever story you chose to follow.

The initial reaction to Cohen’s comedy was simple strain, before deciding whether to laugh or not. You had to laugh, because the pranks were funny, and the timing was spot on. And when you let yourself go, and started to feel comfortable laughing at all the misogynistic, anti-Semitic, homophobic and racist jokes, there was an unexpected sense of liberation. You could be a woman, Jewish or gay. It didn’t matter. In the hands of a masterful comedian who played on people’s ignorance and prejudice, political correctness crumbled into pieces.

Click here for full article (Hürriyet Daily News)