{"id":4220,"date":"2012-01-31T00:42:36","date_gmt":"2012-01-31T05:42:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mondomark.com\/wordpress\/?p=2841"},"modified":"2012-01-31T00:42:36","modified_gmt":"2012-01-31T05:42:36","slug":"yilmaz-guney-part-ii-the-poor-ones-1975","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/?p=4220","title":{"rendered":"Yilmaz G\u00fcney, Part II: The Poor Ones (1975)"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Not a happy dude. At all.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

The screening of The Poor Ones<\/strong> \/ <\/a>Zavallilar<\/a> <\/strong>[M<\/a>] (1975) marks the approximate midpoint in the TIFF Bell Lightbox\u2019s current retrospective of Turkish actor, writer, director Yilmaz Guney<\/a>, and although not as powerful as his Cannes-winning Yol <\/a><\/strong>[M<\/a>] (1982), Poor Ones <\/strong>has its moments of sharp social commentary. It\u2019s also one \u00a0mother of a bleak film, yet Guney clearly took a popular genre from one country and created his own hybrid, infusing it with the so-called mirror images of Turkish society as filtered through his sensibilities.<\/p>\n

A production affected by a major incident \u2013 Guney\u2019s arrest and incarceration \u2013 the film features one of his last major roles in front of the camera before he switched to writing and directing, most of those efforts done from behind bars.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s ironic that an actor who became a star playing rebels and heroes and social misfits, sometimes in trouble with the law, would become a victim himself, but perhaps the deprivation of being a hands-on filmmaker forced him to focus on careful plotting, and richer characters \u2013 the latter giving other actors the kind of meaty roles he had enjoyed and parlayed to great fame.<\/p>\n

The TBL\u2019s series ends Sunday February 5 with his final role as an actor in The Friend<\/a> <\/strong>(1975), but there\u2019s still Elegy <\/a><\/strong>(1971), Bride of the Earth<\/a><\/strong> (1968), and The Hungry Wolves<\/a><\/strong> (1969) playing in between. Plan your week \/ skip classes \/ call in sick accordingly, but don\u2019t cite me as an influence, because I\u2019ll deny it all, including this very sentence you\u2019re reading<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The review of Poor Ones<\/strong> is already up (see above for link), and we\u2019ll see if my schedule can allow for another Guney or two, adding a Part III or IV to this series.<\/p>\n

Unsurprisingly, there are DVDs of his work in Spain, but as we all know Spain contains the World\u2019s Greatest Video Store on the planet, which is why every film you\u2019ve ever wanted exists there on DVD (and if they haven\u2019t released it yet, they will<\/em>.)<\/p>\n

The increasing paucity of catalogue material \u2013 classics, foreign flicks, etc. \u2013 is a major problem for film fans in North America, because the major studios have become highly selective over what vintage and contemporary classics they release on DVD and Blu-ray, redirecting the rest towards MOD delivery via on-demand DVD-Rs and digital streaming.<\/p>\n

Coming very soon is an interview with Nick Redman, veteran soundtrack producer, Oscar Nominated documentary producer (The Wild Bunch: An Album in Montage<\/strong>, co-produced with director Paul Seydor), and co-founder of Twilight Time, the indie home video who recently rescued gems such as The Egyptian<\/a><\/strong> [M<\/a>] and The Rapture<\/a><\/strong> [M<\/a>] from oblivion.<\/p>\n

Although ostensibly a home video label profile, the discussion frequently addresses an issue that\u2019s front and centre with classic film fans: Why have studios largely abandoned their back catalogue?<\/p>\n

Part I of my Twilight Time profile will run later this week, in conjunction with an expanded review of the label\u2019s recent Blu-ray edition of Ray Harryhausen\u2019s Mysterious<\/strong> Island<\/strong>, and I\u2019ll follow up with the label\u2019s latest Blu-ray releases \u2013 John Huston\u2019s The Roots of Heaven<\/strong> (1958), and Joshua Logan\u2019s Picnic<\/strong> (1955).<\/p>\n

Once again for novices: these titles are exclusively available from Screen Archives Entertainment<\/a>. With the exception of Fright Night<\/a><\/strong> [M<\/a>] (1985), all other titles are still in print, so beware of Amazon & eBay speculators wanting a few hundred for something that\u2019s a click away. Also coming soon from the label are Blu-rays of Jean Renoir\u2019s Swamp Water<\/strong> (1941) and George Sidney\u2019s Pal Joey <\/strong>(1957), featuring that goddamn \u201cMy Funny Valentine\u201d song that makes me cry every time. Evil, manipulative thing.<\/p>\n

.<\/span><\/p>\n

.<\/span><\/p>\n

Mark R. Hasan<\/strong>, Editor
\nKQEK.com <\/strong>( Main Site<\/a> \/ Mobile Site<\/a> )<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In Part II, I review The Poor Ones \/ Zavallilar (1975), recently screened at the TIFF Bell Lightbox as part of their series The Way Home: The Films of Turkish Master Yilmaz G\u00fcney.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[6,5],"tags":[1063,658,1013],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8nuyW-164","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4220"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4220"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4220\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4220"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4220"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4220"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}