European Films

Fatih Akin leaves behind the raw power and direct impact tactics of his Golden Bear winner Gegen die Wand (Head-on) for something more evocative and complex with his Cannes Competition film Auf der anderen Seite (The Edge of Heaven; Yasamin kiyisinda in Turkish) -- just note difference between the titles of the two films. The story is still set between Germany and Istanbul and is again in German, Turkish and English, but the two films could not be more different, even to the extent they might satisfy completely different audiences. The presence of Fassbinder legend Hanna Schygulla in the largely Turkish cast as well as further Cannes acclaim and -- possibly -- awards could further boost the film’s profile.

 

The film follows two stories that both end in foretold deaths (the first two parts are called Yeter’s Death and Lotte’s Death) before moving on to the third part that carries the film’s title and has an even stronger sense of continuity after death in the original German, which literally translates as “On the Other Side”.  The German title also points more strongly to the theme of incomprehension that the Germans and Turks have of each other and the preconceived ideas they have of the other party; the whole idea of having sides seems to conveniently overlook the fact they are all humans.  

Yeter (Nursel Koese) is a Turkish prostitute who decides to say yes to an exclusive, live-in contract for her services with the older Ali (Tuncel Kurtiz), a Turkish immigrant in Germany whose son Nejat (Baki Davrak) is a professor of German literature. When his father is sent to jail after hitting Yeter (which results in her death), Nejat leaves the country for Turkey to find the 27-year-old daughter of Yeter and pay for her education – the sole reason why Yeter went into prostitution. Uncertain where she can be found and how much time it will take him to find her, Nejat takes over a local bookshop specialised in German literature.

Yeter’s daughter Ayten (Nurgul Yesilcay) is a Turkish militant who thinks that her mother works in a German shoe shop but who has no further information on here whereabouts. When things get too hot for her in her home country she travels to Germany and desperately starts looking for her mother. During her endless tour of shoe shops, she runs into the university student Lotte (Patrycia Ziolkowska, who already worked with Akin on Solino) with whom she quickly becomes friends to the point of moving in with her, much to the displeasure of Lotte’s mother Susanne (Schygulla), who provides Lotte with a roof over her head.

 

The director’s Gegen die Wand was a straightforward single narrative, while his Solino was a two-part story that allowed a view of the protagonists’ life at two different ages. Auf der andere Seite is not as easily classified, as the two separate stories are not so straightforwardly connected (the shared history of Ayten and Yeter has taken place offscreen before the film begins). Akin’s work is so serene, contemplative and yet so complex that it bypasses any simple comparisons to recent convoluted choral works such as Crash and Babel and offers pleasing touches of Kieslowskian non-coincidences, though Akin is certainly not on the same level as the legendary Polish director of the Decalogue and the Three Colours Trilogy -- at least, not yet.

 

Some of the coincidences and metaphors (a Turkish immigrant's son as a German literature professor?) seem a bit too far-fetched and could have used some fine-tuning. A debate about Turkey's entry in the European Union feels downright silly.

 

As an acting showcase, Auf der anderen Seite is outstanding. Hanna Schygulla gives one of her most riveting performances in years, while the Turkish ensemble is excellent all-round, with Baki Davrak  -- on whom the film opens and closes -- arguably the lead, though he carries it off with a light grace that belies his character's inner trouble.

 

This film was screened as part of the 2007 Cannes Film Festival.