Best Film Award to ‘The Guest’
The Montreal Turkish Film Festival which held May 25-27, celebrated its 10th anniversary this year.
At the Opening Gala, honour plaques and certificates were awarded to sponsors and volunteers who have worked hard for ten years.
In his speech Mr. Ömer F. Özen, the President of the MTFF, thanked those who worked hard and said these: “As we have not found enough support despite our efforts constantly, we have decided to stop this wonderful event at its 10th edition.”
As for Mr. Ali İhtiyar, the vice-president and the artistic director, for his part, underlined these: “this kind of festival, for which we made a lot of effort, can not stand without institutional support. And with great regret, we had taken this decision (to end).”
During the 10th Montreal Turkish Film Festival, the cinema lovers were able to see a total of twenty-two films, including documentaries, short films and feature films.
For the opening film THE GUEST of Andaç Haznedaroğlu was screening, in which the director highlights the problems of Syrian refugees. Among the others, we could see documentary movies and short movies like A STORY WITH MUSIC, HIDDEN HEAVEN, ÜSTAD-I MIH, RONALDO, TOPRAK, THE ALL SEEING BLIND, and THE LAST BEDRETTINIS.
Aside from that, Montreal movie-goers also saw the films like Kıvanç Sezer’s “My Father’s Wings” and Fikret Reyhan’s “Yellow Heat”.
While the Best Film Award was going to Andaç Haznedaroğlu’s “The Guest”, Jale İncekol’s “A Story with Music” received the Best Documentary Award and the film “Ronaldo” of Recep Bozgöz was awarded to Best Short Film.
The last prize was the Jury’s Special Grand Prix.
The Jury of the 10th Montreal Turkish Film Festival, which was composed by Denys Desjardins, Jonathan Lemieux and Selahattin Yıldız, selected the film “Sarı Sıcak / Yellow Heat” of Fikret Reyhan for the Special Grand Prix.
Director Andaç Haznedaroğlu of the movie “The Guest” expressed her feelings about the prize as follows:
“Our film ‘The Guest’ continues to be the voice of Syrian refugees. On behalf of my team, we are proud to be represented and to receive the award at the Montreal Turkish Film Festival. We thank the festival team and the jury.”
Jale İncekol, the director of the documentary “A Story with Music”, shared her feelings for the Best Documentary Award and continued as follows:
“A Story With Music” is a movie about a person who can recreate the world alone. A music teacher from İzmir founds an orchestra with about 40 children from the village at a school in a rural area of Varto district in Muş province. Children play violin, guitar, piano, and sing in Turkish, Kurdish and English. When I first heard this story, it fascinated me. And I thought it would be hope for a lot of people. On the other side of the world, in Canada, it received the Best Documentary Film Award at the Montreal Turkish Film Festival. This is a very significant and special prize for me. I want to thank everyone who worked hard at the Festival.”
Recep Bozgöz, the director of the film “Ronaldo” who won the Best Short Film Award, remarked that he had directed the film with a good team, and thanked the Jury and the Festival.
On the other hand, Fikret Reyhan, director of the film “Yellow Heat” who is awarded the Jury’s Special Grand Prix, thanked them saying:
“Being part of the Montreal Turkish Film Festival, which has an important mission in Canada to promote Turkish cinema, has been very valuable to us.
I would like to express my gratitude to the Jury, which deserves us to the Special Grand Prix, and to all those who contributed to the realization of this significant festival. Many decades I hope!..”
In the Opening Gala, the guests of honour as Mr. Deniz Barkan Umruk, the Consul General of Turkey in Montreal, Mrs. Madeleine Sultan, the Political Attaché of the Ministry of Higher Education of Quebec, Mrs. Rabiye Şeşen, the President of the Turkish Women’s Association of Montreal, Mr. Yılmaz Ekinci, the President of the Turkish Community Centre of Montreal as well as the Montreal film community and a large crowd of movie-goers where presented.
The movies lovers, who heard that the Festival should stop at its tenth edition, expressed their great sadness saying that this was the only way to discover Turkish cinema and Turkish culture and they looked forward to each year the month May to see what’s new…
Bizim Anadolu / Notre Anatolie / July 2018
Please share…
