Crossing the Bridge: The Music of Istanbul

There is no question this documentary celebrating the joyous meeting of Eastern and Western musical traditions lands differently now than when it first screened nearly twenty years ago. It would surely have a very different tone were it produced today, after almost ten years of Recep Erdogan’s increasingly authoritarian rule. Much has changed since Hamburg-born Turkish-German filmmaker Fatih Akin visited the homeland of his ancestors with German Industrial-fusion bassist Alexander Hacke, almost all of it for the worse, but most of the music still holds in Akin’s Crossing the Bridge: The Music of Istanbul, which premieres on MUBi this Friday.

As Hacke explains, while he was scoring Head On, the previous film Akin shot in Turkey, he fell in love with the music and musicians he encountered in Istanbul. He subsequently became a sort of ambassador, who introduces viewers to many of his friends and musicians he admired, but only knew by reputation.

By far, the richest and catchiest music prominently features Turkish and Eastern instrumentation, such as ouds and tablas. Perhaps the exception is Roma musician Selim Sesler. Yet, his distinctive clarinet often sounds like an exotic woodwind, such as a pungi. Interestingly, Sesler and musical colleagues are referred to as “gypsies” throughout Bridge, even amongst themselves, rather than Roma or Sinti, at least according to the translated subtitles this review is based on. Regardless, it is nice to see their culture celebrated.

The same is very definitely true of the Kurdish music championed Aynur Dogan, who performs an arresting Kurdish “lament” in an acoustically pristine 18^th Century Hammam bathhouse. It is a lovely scene in all respects.

In contrast, the segment on Turkish rap is a big nothing. Their claims to aesthetic superiority due to their politically charged rhymes is also dubious. We have plenty of abrasively didactic rappers here as well. Yet, there is an image seen in passing, of graffiti reading “No hip hop yes Muslim” that feels like a portent of things to come when seen from the vantage point of 2024.

Regardless, it is fun to watch the proggy Baba Zula jamming on a barge, after practically making Hacke a full member. It is also cool to see clips of revered saz-player Orhan Gencebay’s cheesy soft-core potboilers, as well as an appealingly intimate and laidback performance. Fittingly, Sezen Aksu, “the Voice of Istanbul” closes the film in proper diva style.

Submitted by Germany: In the Fade

There is no need to beat yourself up if you do not recognize the Queens of the Stone Age song Fatih Akin’s latest film takes its title from, but it is exactly the sort of dark, hard-rocking tune a hot mess like Katja Sekerci would listen to. She married her college dealer while he was still incarcerated. Yet, they both got clean and went straight, becoming stable parents for their studious little boy. It is a story that should have a happy ending, but instead an act of domestic terrorism will leave her grief-stricken and starved for vengeance and closure in Akin’s In the Fade (trailer here), Germany’s shortlisted official foreign language Oscar submission, which opens today in New York.

Through some economical editing, we are sufficiently invested in the Sekerci family when a pipe bomb rips through the Sekerci travel agency and translation service, killing her husband Nuri and young son Rocco. Being lazy civil servants, the cops just want to chalk it up to a former drug connection. However, her description of a rather Aryan-looking woman who left a shiny new bike unattended in front of their store-front eventually leads to the arrest of André and Edda Möller, two suspected members of the very real National Socialist Underground (that is indeed how they choose to self-identify).

A prosecution is soon brought against the Möllers, but Sekerci quickly finds she and her late husband are the ones on trial. Unfortunately, her recent backsliding drug use, brought on by extreme stress, plays right into the hands of the Mephistophelean defense attorney. Even the devastating testimony of Möller’s horrified father Jürgen cannot prevent Sekerci’s shaming and scapegoating. However, much of the information that comes out during the trial will prove useful in a private campaign for vengeance.

The first two acts of Fade are tight, tense, and downright devastating. Although Akin and Hark Bohm’s screenplay is mostly about violence motivated by bigotry, it also offers some insight into the pressures faced by recovering addicts. Unfortunately, the third act gets a bit wishy-washy, perhaps because of worries the film might get tagged with the Death Wish-style revenge thriller label. Yet, the original Bronson Death Wish is far more nuanced than most people realize (granted, the subsequent sequels, not so much).

Nevertheless, Diane Kruger’s harrowingly performance is the engine that will probably drive Germany to another best foreign language Academy Award. Her emotional wounds are so palpably realistic, it is hard to watch her go to such dark places. She could even be a player for best actress, unless the Academy wants to reward Meryl Streep for speaking out against her old colleague Harvey Weinstein after the extent of his horrid deviancy was already fully revealed.

Most of the rest of the cast are mainly cardboard villains who exist to drive sympathy for Sekerci or blandly shallow friends who are there just for the sake of losing patience with her. The exception is the great Ulrich Tukur (John Rabe, The Lives of Others), who will quietly but surely stagger viewers in his pivotal scenes as the decent Jürgen Möller.

Josh Homme (of the aforementioned Queens) penned an aptly heavy and jangling score, while cinematographer Rainer Klausman gives it all a stylishly ominous look. The only drawback comes when Akin realizes how thoroughly he stacked the deck and starts to add unwanted hand-wringing. His critical champions are calling this a return to form, but it actually fits better with his bizarrely under-valued Armenian genocide film, The Cut, then his character-driven indies, like the utterly unsoulful Soul Kitchen. Worth seeing for Kruger’s brave performance and as a wake-up call regarding the violent activities of the National Socialist Underground, In the Fade opens today (12/27) in New York, at the IFC Center and the Landmark 57.

The Cut: Surviving the Armenian Genocide

If you want to generate an avalanche of email, some of which speculating on the nature of your parentage, than merely point out somewhere online that the Muslim Ottoman Empire essentially invented genocide in 1915. No serious historian disputes the Armenian Genocide, but the denial reaches levels well past the absurd, approaching outright lunacy. Therefore it is somewhat encouraging to see hardcore leftist Turkish-German filmmaker Fatih Akin seriously address the subject. His reference point is more The Searchers than Schindler’s List, but there is no denying the enormity of the events of 1915 in Akin’s The Cut (trailer here), which opens this Friday in New York.

In his Armenian enclave bordering Syria, Nazaret Manoogian can tell an ill wind is blowing from Constantinople, but he hopes the worst of it will be the impressment and slave labor endured by the village’s able-bodied men. Alas, true horrors await when they finally finish the highway for the military. The entire work party is then massacred by a group of convicts specifically liberated for such duties. However, Mehmet the thief has no stomach for mass murder. At risk of death he slices Manoogian’s throat, but only cuts deep enough to sever his vocal chords, rather than a major artery.

The resuscitated Armenian and Mehmet soon fall in with an apolitical group of Turkish deserters, but Manoogian subsequently lights out on his own after hearing survivors have congregated in Ras-al-Ayn, essentially to wait for death. From there, Manoogian will follow an epic trail that leads through Syria, Lebanon, Cuba, Florida, Minnesota, and North Dakota, in search of his surviving twin daughters, Lucinee and Arsinee.

Akin deserves credit for fully facing up to the Armenian Genocide in the Ras-al-Ayn sequences, as well as the brutal mass murder of his fellow villagers, but it clearly makes him uncomfortable. Arguably, the film’s emotional power peaks in the Ras-al-Ayn dying fields. For the next two acts, Akins seems to be desperately searching for “righteous” Muslims to protect Manoogian and thuggish Americans to torment him as he pursues his quest.

Nevertheless, Akin absorbed plenty of the right lessons from John Ford. The vistas do indeed sweep. Alexander Hacke’s muted electronic soundtrack is also quite effective, creating an appropriately otherworldly vibe. Truly, there are times when Manoogian might as well be on Mars. However, the narrative’s Homeric episodic nature is inevitably uneven. Some scenes just work better than others.

Still, Tahar Rahim nicely anchors the film with necessarily quiet power. He is acutely expressive without ever indulging in exaggeration or Streep-like excess. Once again, the Cecil B. DeMille-worthy supporting cast is a decided mixed bag, with Bartu Kucukcaglayan and Kevork Malikyan earning notice as Mehmet and the Cuban barber who befriends Manoogian, respectively.

When Raphael Lemkin coined the term “genocide,” he did so specifically in response to the systematic Ottoman massacre of Armenians. Frankly, the denial is becoming toxic for the deniers, so if someone with Akin’s ideological standing acknowledges the historical record, it might just help dilute some of the vitriol. The Cut is not perfect but it towers above his unsoulful Soul Kitchen. Recommended on balance for those interested in the Armenian Genocide (a tragedy scarcer than albino elephants in cinema), The Cut opens this Friday (9/18) in New York, at the Landmark Sunshine and Lincoln Plaza Cinemas.

Soul Kitchen: Who Stole the Soul?

Talk about bait and switch. Instead of soul food, they serve nouveau fusion cuisine and alt-rock has replaced the classic soul music, yet Zinos still calls his restaurant Soul Kitchen. It does not seem to hurt business though in Fatih Akin’s Soul Kitchen (trailer here), which opens this Friday in New York.

German-Greek restaurateur Zinos is not much of a cook, but his regulars eat up his greasy down-home offerings anyway. Recuperating from a back injury, Zinos makes a fateful decision, hiring a legit gourmet chef as his temporary replacement. In addition to being a culinary artist, Shayn happens to be Roma and intimidates people with his knife wielding prowess (nope, no cultural stereotypes going on here). Shayn alienates the local clientele with his new menu, but the hipsters start coming in droves. When Zinos hires his waiter Lutz’s grunge group to be the house band, suddenly Soul Kitchen is the in-scene.

Of course, Zinos is still besieged with a plague of dramas, most of which stem from Neumann (insert Seinfeld joke here), his long lost childhood chum, now a successful real estate developer. In Kitchen’s contrived world, such a profession guarantees his villainy. True to course, as soon as they reconnect, Neumann is scheming to swindle Zinos out of his primo property. Unfortunately, the unkempt restaurant proprietor is seriously distracted with his efforts to save his relationship with the severely Teutonic Nadine. Not for an instant though, are they remotely believable as a couple. On top of everything else, Zinos has to worry about his compulsive gambling brother, currently enjoying a prison furlough. Hey, no worries, everyone’s family at Soul Kitchen.

From the evil businessmen to the grumpy old neighbor, Kitchen does not miss a single cliché. That might have been forgivable had the film had a sense of fun. However, it is a surprisingly dour and uninvolving film. And yes, the largely Euro-alternative soundtrack is a major disappointment, given what one would expect from the title (and the misleading trailer).

Adam Bousdoukos tries to hit a likably nebbish note as Zinos, but he is such a doormat for trouble, it is hard to maintain a rooting interest in him. As Nadine, Pheline Roggan looks uncomfortable in every scene, which frankly makes her performance Kitchen’s most believable. The most intriguing turn comes from Anna Bederke as Lucia, the slightly less Teutonic waitress. Most of the cast though seems stuck on uber-indie quirky.

To get an idea of the fantasy world Kitchen is coming from, Zinos can expect compassion from the tax inspector and treachery from anyone with a real job. With few laughs in the offing, it all gets rather tiring. Aside from a bit of Quincy Jones’ “Hicky-Burr” (which is all kinds of awesome, by the way) the dark, hard-edged soundtrack is also mostly off-key. Safely skippable, Kitchen opens tomorrow (8/20) in New York at the IFC Center.