Çoğunluk

Twenty-one-year-old Mertkan lives in Istanbul. Although safe and stable, his life is entirely unfulfilling. He lives with his parents, helps out at his father’s construction company, and spends evenings with his friends cruising shopping malls and discos. After meeting a girl named Gül and gaining a little self-confidence, it seems that Mertkan will find the strength to stand up to his authoritarian father; the elder man is against a relationship with a girl whose “people only want to divide our country.” Will Mertkan find the determination to avoid becoming the kind of man that his domineering father wants him to be? With a sure hand, this family drama subtly delves into criticism of Turkish society and its ills. The director’s seemingly detached look at the characters enables him to penetrate their inner worlds, their emotional lives. The events of an ordinary existence transform into an absorbing struggle for liberation from parental domination, one that requires sufficient will and decisiveness. (Karlovy Vary International Film Festival)