A universal touch to local clichés / Kerem Akça

2011.05.13
haberturk.com

In the seventh art, visualising the characters’ state of mind requires a subtle motivation, point of view and ideology. In the history of cinema, Andrei Tarkovsky, who gave individuals alienated in a particular place stylised and mystical universes, offered the most striking formula in this respect. Here Selim Güneş, perhaps as if in response to “Sonbahar”, brings to the screen the subjective world of a child in a Black Sea village who wrestles with death and financial hardship and seems trapped in limbo. Steeped in adjectives such as silent, mystical, abstract, unconventional, mythological, stylised, surrealist, subjective, existentialist and poetic, “White as Snow” builds a universal cinematic language on our class problems while also tearing down that ‘sincere village film’ formula we are used to. In doing so, it heralds the birth of yet another cinephile director of ours who thinks hard about cinema.

Clearly, after “Sonbahar” (2008), turning Turkey’s natural beauty into a ‘space of alienation’ is going to become a trend. Selim Güneş’s first film “White as Snow” (2010), while following a ‘little dialogue, lots of cinema’ strategy, falls no short at this stage of where that work stands. It could even be said that the film rises above that point. For what we have before us is a work that, without wallowing in sentimentality as much as that one, grasps its cinematic consequences with an extremely professional and detached eye.

It draws its source from Tarkovsky and Sokurov

For what the director sets out in dealing with the state of mind of a child with serious problems, in financial distress, has gained an international meaning by drawing strength from Andrei Tarkovsky’s model of film. With its stylised world, “White as Snow” recalls on one side his “Mirror” (“Zerkalo”, 1975) and on the other Sokurov’s “Mother and Son” (“Mat i Syn”, 1997), which renewed the master’s cinema.

Selim Güneş’s unique universe creates a feeling of lack of communication through a Laz song, lines of poetry and dialogue, and builds the boy’s relationship with those around him and with his mother along the same lines. When metaphorical touches such as the horse, the forest, the knife, the cut wall and the red paint are added, this place caught between death and life becomes open to almost mythical, mystical and fantastic readings.

Open to different readings

The timeless ‘snow-white universe’, which in Christianity might represent the void (limbo), seems to correspond to the araf in our culture. Seen from a mythological angle, it recalls the feeling of being trapped and caught in between of Hades. In short, “White as Snow” focuses on psychological, philosophical, mythological and religious texts that emerge through a character’s loneliness.

Seen from this angle, it is in fact no accident that Güneş, while capturing the state of mind of 10-year-old Hasan through unconventional angles and use of sound, adds hopeful metaphors such as the ‘white horse’. For there is a reason why this symbol, which according to Islamic myths means ‘the one that carries you to the other world’, stands there. It could also be said that the film establishes an intellectual link with Nietzsche’s views. The horizon-broadening cinematographic insights captured in CinemaScope format also contribute greatly to this whole.

It proves how a snowy landscape can be made spiritual and cinematic

In light of all these aims of the director, we can see that, in conveying a character’s state of mind, he creates a film of atmosphere through point-of-view shots, close-ups of objects left far from the characters, the use of slow motion that disrupts the main flow, a subtle sound design, and much more. Accordingly, it could also be said that what appears on the canvas opens up into a Sofia Coppola-like poem of non-communication through people who do not talk to each other.

Starting with its abstract title, “White as Snow” offers us the equivalent of a truly naturalist and stylised work of cinema. It proves once more, to a number of third-world cinemas as well, Kazakhstan’s above all, how a snowy landscape can be made spiritual and cinematic.

In achieving this, the film owes a great deal to its intelligence in reflecting the state of crisis of the lower class living in a village in the Black Sea region through the eyes of a child struggling to provide for his mother and two siblings. For we can say that the director, who draws heavily on non-diegetic sound (sound outside the story), also consistently integrates into the whole a cinematography that moves back and forth between white and grey tones and contributes to psychological expression.

It has used the HD camera and the CinemaScope ratio at an international level

With the support it gets from its shot scales, its musical entrances, the arrangement of its story structure and its minimal (heartfelt) performances, “White as Snow” has made the grade when it comes to how a universal work of cinema is produced. Happily, new-generation Turkish directors with a command of cinema, like Selim Güneş, are able to draw something from sociologically rich and poignant stories. Indeed, with his skill in using the CinemaScope ratio and HD, he has practically turned the saying ‘the fish rots from the head’ on its head.

It is clear that the director perhaps took courage from Reha Erdem’s meticulous sound editing, from Özcan Alper having used the formula before, or from the abstract and grey quality that “Üç Maymun” (2008), “Kosmos” (2009) and “Pus” (2009) achieved with the same type of camera. But Güneş has proved that he is aware of this too, by knowing how to draw his own interpretation from them.

A multi-layered poem on social problems in Turkey’s village life

For the cinematic equivalent of a silent yet brimming soul could only have been made this striking on screen by drawing strength from the technical possibilities of cinema. Perhaps “White as Snow” will be remembered as a multi-layered poem on Turkey’s class problems.

And most importantly, our village films, which we are used to seeing as at times amateurish, at times crude, at times merely sincere, find here an equivalent worthy of world cinema. Turkish cinema needs such postmodern-minded and innovative directors these days. We hope that, as Güneş takes steps to carry his career further, he will not only keep the same ideological stance but also take into account the weaknesses of atmosphere in the opening part of “White as Snow”.

*****

*** http://www.haberturk.com/kultur-sanat/haber/630096-peki-ya-dunyayi-kilise-yonetseydi

*** http://www.keremakca.net/karbeyaz.html