56th Edinburgh International Film Festival. Fate and Confession. Review.

Fate / Confession

One of the festivals main highlights and strong competitor for discovery of the year is the first two parts of an as yet uncompleted trilogy from Turkey called ‘Tales Against Darkness‘ (the director was unable to attend the festival because he was shooting the last part this summer.) Zeki Demirkubuz not only writes and directs but also produces and edits his films (he also acts as his own DOP on Confession (Ítíraf, Turkey, 2002). Fate (Yazgi, Turkey, 2001), a fascinating work of adaptation from Albert Camus’s ‘L’Etranger’, follows the novel to a point before it sets out on its own track. One of the most remarkable facets of these films is that there are total confidence and patience, with information held back till the breaking point and no qualms about working from a source that would be too daunting for many a filmmaker. The films are pared down and claustrophobic studies of decay and collapse, of the attraction of darkness (an element that is integrated into the images, from the early shot in Fate where we watch from the end of a corridor all the lights slowly switch off till all that illuminates the image is the distant bedroom window of the protagonist’s mother, to the framing against the night sky in Confession.) In Confession, a study of jealousy and burning uncertainty, we are immersed in the taunt drama between a couple with a scarred past. This more so than ‘Fate’ relies on the structure of information, like a confession, with glimpses of information constantly realigning the status quo. The film starts in relative silence, the liturgical pace is finally broken and we are propelled into the drama on the back of an overheard conversation, the connotations of which explode within the opening silence. These two films are remarkable studies of contemporary ailments, but also highly philosophical works (especially Fate) that explore nihilism and despotism with a bracing assurance as well as a sly wit.

56th Edinburgh International Film Festival. 2003.