Non realist tendencies in new Turkish cinema

Abstract

The realist tendency which had been dominant in cinema became more apparent with Italian neorealism affecting other national cinemas to a large extent. With the changing and developing socio economic and cultural dynamics, realism gradually has stopped being a natural constituent of cinema and the rate of observing non realist films has started to increase in cinema. Along the same line, Turkish cinema was also impressed by the realist tendencies especially with the classic realist films in Yeşilçam period and with Yılmaz Güney’s social realism. However, as for 80s in Turkish cinema, the non realist films have been observed with some films of Atıf Yılmaz, and especially by 2000s some prominent directors of new Turkish cinema such as Onur Ünlü, Semih Kaplanoğlu and Reha Erdem have dealt with those kinds of films. In this thesis, the mentioned directors are investigated within the context of how they conceive and construct their cinematic world, and in this regard, this thesis provides a close reading on their non realist tendencies which are discussed over some of their films in terms of their approaches as magical realism with Onur Ünlü, spiritual realism with Semih Kaplanoğlu and anthropocene realism with Reha Erdem.