Films/DVD Asylum

"Once Upon a Time in Anatolia:" from the Turkish director

67.160.130.12

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Nuri Bilge Ceylan (he also helmed the excellent, "Distant"); it begins with a small convoy snaking its way through a desolate countryside transporting a man who's confessed to a murder and the prosecutor, police investigator, doctor, and soldiers whom he is leading to the burial site.
This is a long film, but it's 150 minutes are well spent: through the course of the exhaustive search, for the murderer alleges he was drunk at the time and cannot properly remember the exact location, we get to know much about the key figures, about how that society functions, about the tensions between old and modern Turkey, about those between the city and the rural societies.
But it isn't a dry examination of these subjects; indeed, the ideas are expressed, many times, in simple actions. It also is a film with several moments of almost unsurpassed beauty.
This film deservedly won the highest prize at Cannes.
I've seen it twice and look forward to another viewing; the second was even more enjoyable.

Edits: 01/26/13

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