The Bismil municipality of the Kurdish-majority city Diyarbakır (Amed) in Turkey has announced that ‘Open Air Film Days’ events will take place from 15 to 24 September. They will include international and local films with Turkish and Kurdish voiceovers.
The ten-day open air event will take place in five different parks of the city and will include the screening of film classics like ‘My Neighbour Totoro’ and ‘The Legend of the Ugly King’, which is about the life and career of the Kurdish actor and filmmaker Yilmaz Güney, who died in exile in Paris in 1984.
Güney is best known for his film ‘Yol (The Road)’ which he wrote the script for while he was in prison. The movie, which points out the injustices that took place in Turkey, the Kurdish question, and the 12 September coup d’état, was banned in Turkey until 1999.
The film ‘Gênco’, produced by Kurdish filmmaker Ali Kemal Çinar will also be shown. Çinar is also known for the movie ‘In between’, which will be featured in this year’s edition of the New York Kurdish Film Festival.
Bismil Municipality Culture and Social Affairs Director Zehra Yüksekbag stated that films will be screened for all age groups in the event and explained that they will continue such activities continuously due to the lack of cinema and theatre halls in the district. She added that with the beginning of the new school year, they will continue to organise such activities in order to open social spaces for young people and children.
The ‘Open Air Film Days’ also aim to draw attention to the threats and attacks the Kurdish culture and language is still facing in Turkey every day. Most recently, a Kurdish man was stabbed to death in Istanbul on 2 September for speaking Kurdish.
