Director: Fatih Akin, Ger/Tur, 121min
Stars: Sibel Kekilli, Birol Ünel, Catrin Striebeck, Güven Kirac
On selected release, in German
Self-destruction and unconventional romance collide when the repressed twentysomething Sibel (Kekilli) and the bitter, bereaved thirty-something Cahit (Unel) meet in a Hamburg psychiatric unit. Desperate to escape her family’s cosseting, Sibel pesters Cahit to enter into a sham marriage, persuading her parents and brother that she has fallen in love with a fellow Turk. Behind this respectable veneer, the pair’s relationship evolves from hedonism to tenderness, before emotions run irrevocably off the rails.
Akin seems intent on upsetting conservative audiences, and sometimes this seems forced; even the casting — of the erstwhile porn actress Kekilli — has provoked controversy. There are imaginative and humorous flourishes here — a traditional Turkish chorus marks “chapters” of the story, while the contrast of wholesome white wedding and sexual hypocrisy is wryly funny. The film’s taut pace, punctuated with brutal outbursts, flags towards the end, but Ünel’s battle-scarred performance has a powerful impact.
Arwa Haider