| FEATURES |
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“Interview with Yilmaz Arslan, Director of Fratricide “ |
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| “Interview with Yilmaz Arslan, Director of Fratricide “ |
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Q. What is the situation between Kurds and Turks in Turkey today?
Compared with the past, the situation is fairly peaceful! Because the Turkish policies have achieved their objectives. The Turkish government has in the past deployed military force to achieve the widespread and systematic displacement of the Kurdish population, forcing them from their homelands.
Thus the Kurds have been spread throughout Turkey. The aim of these strategies was to destroy cultural and social links between the Kurdish people and to force them to submit to a process of assimilation in Western Turkey. In this way the situation has been calmed, and again the Kurds have the right to speak their own language and partake of their own culture, their own folklore, again.
Q. What problems do these two communities confront in Germany? Do they co-exist more peaceably once they are away from their homeland?
In Germany, Turks and Kurds don't have major problems, at least not those which can be resolved politically. They experience the very real difficulties common to all immigrants, and which each must learn to deal with in his own way.
Q. Why does your film take its inspiration from Classical Tragedy? How do you fit this form to the Turkish-Kurdish conflict?
Tragedy is an 'ancestral form'. The very first performances were tragedies. Tragedy contains a certain form and a sort of narrative which I wanted to follow. In fact, I used all the fundamental elements of classical
tragedy: the Hero and Anti-Hero; Tiresias the Oracle; the Messanger, who in this case transmits only messages of disaster; and the Chorus, composed of old Kurds. The Kurdish-Turkish conflict has existed for a long time. And tragedy is in fact a parable, as old as the conflict itself. It's a clear warning that we would be better to have done with these catastrophes and return to reason.
Q. FRATRICIDE shows characters from all generations, children to grandparents. The story is full of different conflicts, the film is very rich. Did you intend to address the questions of immigration and integration in their full complexity?
Nowadays, in the media, 25 is the average age. Everone is brighter than bright, toned and beautiful. If you look more closely, everyone has the same arse! It's the contemporary media aesthetic. In a sea of arses, you can no longer make out one from the others. But reality doesn't consist of identical arses. The world offers a torrent of experiences which we, as directors, have to date failed to portray. I could not have left out the older generation, our parents: that would have been criminal!
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Q. How did you find working with non-professional actors?
It's like with wild animals: you tame them... nonetheless, they retain a bit of wildness. A domestic cat dozing on the sofa interests me very little!
Q. You shot part of FRATRICIDE in Kurdistan. Were conditions difficult?
I went to the country as a tourist, and no one knew that I was going to film there. Best let sleeping dogs lie...
Q. The visual style is very realist, hand-held camera and so forth, and at the same time the story, while raw and brutal, has a sort of magical artmosphere, for example in the animation sequence with Ibo. It's an interesting contrast.
Ibo is the youngest of the story's heroes, he's a child! But in this story he cannot live out his childhood fully, the circumstances in which he is forced to exist have stolen it from him. This animated sequence is nothing else than a little blast of freedom, a visionary flight towards his childhood, and perhaps towards ours too!
Q. The score employs a mixture of traditional instruments, and at the same time you use a lot of contemporary Turkish music. Is this a way of creating a link between ancient and modern times?
I find the music succeeds pretty well. There is something sickly about its expresssion, just as the story speaks partly of sickness. |
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Q. FRATRICIDE is a co-production between three countries, which is a little strange for a film with such a 'German' theme. Was it hard raising finance in Germany?
At the time, there wasn't as much money, there weren't as many sponsors for films as there are today. All the same, I have to say that it's still almost impossible to make a film without TV participation, strictly with German funds. Before, there was less money but the range of films was wider.
Today, there's certainly more money, but they're not offering prime position to me...
Q. What do you think the response will be when the film is released in Germany. It takes a very critical stance on the country.
I really couldn't give a shit! (It's a quote from my new film). Certainly I would care about the film's reception in Germany had I made a "Heimat film", a movie about the German fatherland. But with FRATRICIDE, what's most important for me is the film's reception internationally, and that seems to me to be shaping up well! Even before we'd finished shooting, the rights had been sold in several countries worldwide. Now I'm impatient to see how the film will be received in Locarno, and how the rest of the rights will go.
It's a tremendous feeling, to be chosen exactly for what one is and not for what one should be!
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