INTERVIEW / Selim Güneş / Seda Pekçelen

TimeOut, May 2011

One of this month’s standout films is ‘White as Snow’, which was also screened at the İstanbul Film Festival last month. We talked to director Selim Güneş, who comes from photography, about his much-awarded first film.

You are a photographer by profession, and ‘White as Snow’ is your first film. When did you first feel the urge to make a feature film? How long have you been living and breathing the dream of your first film?

For some photographers, cinema is always there in a corner of their mind. In my heart, too, lay the wish to be a filmmaker. I had been interested in cinema since childhood. My uncle Hasan Güneş ran a cinema. We were always inside the world of cinema anyway, as viewers, as readers… So I can’t say there was a particular day when I said, “I must make films now.” With photography it became more pronounced, of course. I used to tell a story in my slide shows too. Some of my photographs are like the opening or closing image of a scene. So for me, photography and cinema always existed together.

Directors who come from photography usually give themselves away through the image quality of their films. In what ways did your photographer’s eye help you while shooting a feature film?

A photographer’s eye is both an advantage and a disadvantage for cinema. If you think of what you are going to tell in photographic terms, you drift away from cinema. Before starting in cinema, I did research like a student. What I had to pay most attention to was what the images would be like. A photographic image may be very good as an image. But if it loses its meaning in moving pictures, that is a disadvantage. It’s a knife-edge situation, you see. I was very careful to use the advantage. What is the scene telling us, where should we put the camera, what should the shot size be, did I get what I wanted in this shot? So, paying attention to these questions and working backwards from the end, I think my experience in photography contributed to my film when I was deciding on the image.

‘White as Snow’ won the Best Film Music Award at the Antalya Golden Orange Film Festival, the Special Jury Award at the Sofia International Film Festival, and at the Ankara International Film Festival the Mahmut Tali Öngören Special Award (Best Second Film), the Promising New Screenwriter award and the Best Supporting Actress award. It was also screened in the World Cinema category at the Chicago Film Festival. Did you expect to be accepted by so many festivals with your first film? How did you feel?

When the editing was finished, I felt that the film had turned out just the way I wanted. Looking at it objectively, I thought it could find a place at festivals. Even being invited by some festivals was like an award. But when you compete, you also hope to win awards. Naturally, we were happy when we won.

In your conversations with audiences or critics at the festivals you attended with ‘White as Snow’, do you come across interpretations and readings of the film that you hadn’t anticipated? If there are comments that surprised you, could you share them?

Of course, there are a few comments that excited me. In particular, the comments of a woman in Chicago, a literature teacher, excited me a great deal. She had shared her appreciation with us in a long piece of writing; let me share part of it: ‘My favourite film at this year’s film festival is a Turkish film called ‘White as Snow’. It is a timeless work. The reason I love this film is that it doesn’t need words. It conveys the characters’ actions through emotions and images rather than dialogue. Their next steps are triggered by what they perceive from nature.’ It is wonderful that someone who doesn’t know our language or our culture shares the same feelings about our film as we do. In Sofia, the warm, sincere views of Iglika Triffonova, a well-known Bulgarian woman director (director of ‘Letters to America’), also made us happy. And in Antalya, a housewife said, “Some things are going round in my head right now. Some feelings are mixed up, and I’m trying to piece them together.” That affected me deeply too. And we generally saw that women were more affected after the film.

‘White as Snow’ won the Best Film Music Award at the Antalya Golden Orange Film Festival. Who is the music by?

In your view, how much does the use of music in a film help the director express what they want to say? Some directors, for example, rely on the elements of cinematic narration and prefer not to use any music at all. The film’s music director is Mircan. When I heard the lullaby sung by Mircan that plays at the end of the film, I said this music had to be the film’s music. Its lyrics and melody matched the emotion of the film very closely. My film is told through image, sound and music. In some places the image comes to the fore, in others the sound, in others the music. Where these are not enough, dialogue steps in. Some directors prefer not to use music, others prefer to use it. How to tell the story is entirely the director’s choice.

You adapted the screenplay of ‘White as Snow’ from Sabahattin Ali’s ‘Ayran’. Why did you settle on this work? What affected you most about it?

When I read Sabahattin Ali’s story ‘Ayran’, the thought ‘this story would make a beautiful film’ lodged in a corner of my mind. When I decided to move from photography into directing, this story came to mind again. A writer once called it “a story that pierces your heart like a bullet.” ‘Ayran’ truly made me feel that way. When I decided to turn this story into a film, my greatest support came from Nesli Çölgeçen, director of unforgettable films such as ‘Selamsız Bandosu’ and ‘Züğürt Ağa’. With Çölgeçen’s words, ‘If this story is going to become a film, Selim, you’re the one to make it,’ I rolled up my sleeves for ‘White as Snow’ in 2008.

Do you have screenplays of your own? If so, do you intend to shoot them soon?

I don’t have a finished screenplay at the moment. Two screenwriter friends of mine are working on the screenplay for the second film. I shared what I want to tell, where and how. I am part of the screenwriting team. My aim is not to be a screenwriter. My aim is to film the screenplays I want and love. I am also working on a screenplay adapted from a novel. So I no longer write alone. At least I have no intention of doing so for the second film. Maybe in the future…

Hakan Korkmaz, who plays the lead in ‘White as Snow’, had no previous acting experience. How did you find him? How did you take the risk of giving the lead role to someone with no acting experience?

I did a long casting search for ‘White as Snow’. Photographs of a great many children came in. Hakan is a boy who lives in Demirciler village in Borçka, my own hometown. He is my neighbour’s son. When I went to Artvin to scout locations and went to my own village to stay for a while, I saw Hasan. And from his posture and the way he looked, I said this boy is the Hasan of the story. I said Hakan is Hasan.

The press notes for ‘White as Snow’ say: ‘While drawing hope out of hopelessness, Selim Güneş salutes a John Lennon line he loves dearly: “Where there is life, there is hope.”’ John Lennon must be one of the people who inspire you. What is it about Lennon that affects you? Are there other people who have affected you in this way? Who, and why?

John Lennon is an artist who influenced not just me but millions of people with his music, his worldview and his stance. Naturally, there are many people who have influenced me. The answer to the question of who would be very long. The answer to the question of why is always the same: they are human beings in the truest sense. Just like Lennon.

What will your next project be? Will you carry on with photography, or is there a new film project coming up soon?

I have a photography project. At the same time, we have started work on the second film. I will carry the two forward side by side for a while.

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