Moving Stills: The Idea of Nature in New Turkish Cinema

Abstract

Environmental issues started to find place in Turkish films from 1950’s, but in the period after 1990’s, there was a rise in the films that embody an ‘intuitive approach’ to nature, mostly in the narratives that are not necessarily focusing on environmental themes. This chapter examines the shifting ecological understandings in Turkish film history and focus on realist art house films of this ongoing period of New Turkish Cinema. These films follow stories evolving around issues of non-belonging and identity as they portray an external nature in rural contexts, mainly from an outsider perspective of urbanite directors and characters. It is claimed that they build up a cinematographic eco-awareness, while at the same time create a binary between nature and society, opposite to the ecological discourse that calls for a relational approach. Taking examples from the films of internationally acclaimed directors such as Reha Erdem, Nuri Bilge Ceylan and Semih Kaplanoğlu, the idea of nature that these films promote in a social context is discussed considering debates on urban-rural dichotomy in contemporary Turkey.