Format: Streaming video from NetFlix on rockin’ flatscreen.
With Uzak (Distant), Turkish director Nuri Bilge Ceylan has given me something of a poser. I’ve been sitting here looking at this almost-blank document for 20 minutes trying to think of something to say about this film and honestly, not much is coming. I’m not sure that this is a fault in the film. Ceylan’s film is simultaneously a brilliant piece of cinema and dreadfully dull—but it’s dull by intent.
Mahmut (Muzaffer Ozdemir) is a commercial photographer living in Istanbul. There was a time when he was greatly interested in art and the more artistic side of his profession, but time and necessity have turned him into a sort of wage slave. Mahmut seems to be passively dead from the neck up. Things change, or at least have the potential to change, when his cousin Yusuf (Emin Toprak) arrives from the country. Yusuf has lost his job in a factory when the factory closed. He’s come to Istanbul with the dream of working on a ship, hoping that not only will he see the world, but also make money.
