Today, “The House By the Sea”, by R. Guediguan, “Elena” by A. Zvyagintsev and “A Man of Integrity” by M. Rasoulof was among the screening films from the selection.
“Centaur”, a film by Aktan Arym Kubat, competing in the International Competition section this year was screened also today and after the screening, there was a talk with A. A. Kubat, the director, screenwriter and the actor of the film. The movie tells the story of a man, a rider (Kubat) who was nicknamed Centaur a long time ago. He lives a simple life as a family man; he’s married to deaf and mute woman called Maripa and they have a little son, whom they fear can also be mute. Centaur used to be a projectionist but as the local population gradually converted to Islam, the theater was turned into a mosque. Now he works as a casual laborer. Centaur, stealing horses and riding into the night, is not keeping the animal but releases him. The unharmed horse is then recovered and is in the village, while Centaur is already back at home enjoying his time with his family. When he gets caught, he tells why he’s doing it, crying. We understand that he’s struggling against his own impulses and he’s a man who tries to keep his historical, social and religious bonds.
The director answered questions telling that these are real circumstances in his country and these things need to be thought through so he wanted to make a film like this. He said he really tried hard to find a pure hearted man for this role and he couldn’t find so he acted. He said he was a painter, an artist in Kyrgyzstan for 10 years but then he started shooting movies without any education. As an answer for a question about the criticism in the movie, he explained there’s no criticism to Islam which is one of the biggest religions in the world but the criticism was to the Arabs in his country who don’t live Islam truely. He said we learned Islam as being a pure person, not harming or being against anyone. He explained that there was this Soviet pressure in his country and now there’s Arab pressure. So he wanted to tell all these by the help of a lonely man figure. He said it was a sign of respect to show Soviet drama “The Red Apple” in his movie.
“Ise Yarar Bir Sey (Something Useful)”, a film by Pelin Esmer, competing in the National International Competition this year was screened after Centaur’s talk. After Esmer’s first documentary “The Collector”, she founded her own film company Sinefilm, and made her feature films “The Play”, “10 to 11” and “Watchtower.” She was invited to Cannes Film Festival’s Résidence du Cinéfondation in Paris where she wrote the script for “10 to 11.” Her films have been premiered at important festivals like San Sebastian, Tribeca, Toronto, Rotterdam, received many awards and were released in Turkey, Germany, France and US. In 2016, she finished shooting her last film “Something Useful” which is released this year. The poetic story is based on two women’s friendship in a train travel which leads to mysterious events. After the screening, Pelin Esmer accepted compliments about the film more than having questions from the audience.
More competition films will be screened in the remaining days and the excitement level keep rising as the closing night approaches.
