By Heidi Trautmann
The definition of ‘impression’: Something or somebody leaves an imprint on your mind, your soul, your senses and starts initiating thoughts, feelings. The film ANAHTAR I recently saw at Lemar’s cinema in Nicosia left a deep imprint on my senses.
There is the key-cutter, who has the second sight with the touch of his fingers on any key he receives to copy, and also when his young nephew Selim has one made he is deeply troubled and warns not only Selim but shares his thoughts with the family.
The film, freshly out of Cemal Yildirim’s camera, the director, is based on the book ‘Autumn’ written by Ferhat Atik after a true story, a crime, happening in Cyprus in the 70s.
Ferhat Atik also did the screen adaptation to today’s life.
The mystic charm of the camera’s work on filming spots of Cyprus’s past and their own vibrant history and the sensitive directing draws the viewer into the centre of the story proceedings and nothing seems as it is; there is a deeper explanation for everything, there is love and despair, human weakness, and finally the crime in itself becomes a sad fact of life, having our pity in the end.
Wonderful acting by the cast: Hatice Tezcan, Cihan Tarıman, Hüseyin Ağlamaz, Bariş Refikoğlu, Bariş Burcu, Fevzi Tanpınar, Riza Şen, the cast being partly from the professional Nicosia Municipality Theatre.
The story of love between Ümran and Selim, touchingly played by Hatice Tezcan and Cihan Tariman, the main characters, begins at the beautiful and recently renovated bookstore ‘Rüstem’ in Nicosia with its wonderful special atmosphere of literature. All the key scenes are set in well chosen sites, full of symbolic tell tales: the growing love in a wide field of sunny mustard flowers, the story of confessions under the arches of the mosque; despair and unhappiness in a isolated lane of the Old City of Nicosia.
I hope to see more of Cemal Yildirim, he has done a very good job. His film will be shown at the Istanbul Film Festival End of March and April 2012.
A simple human story well told. The film is actually shown at Lemar’s film theatres and Galleria, you will find the viewing times in the internet.