Revolutionaries passed before the streets of the 1960s on the road to democracy. Then the youth with the victory songs, the workers with the rebel flags, the rightists, the leftists and the putschists again. The country spent 12 years in the grip of the revolution and in the end all roads came to the same crossroads. Ankara was restless in the minutes when the ousted prime minister of the Democratic Party, Adnan Menderes, was hanged. The news of Menderes' execution had not yet come. There was an anxious wait in the houses. Ears were on the radio. Everyone was wondering what happened in Imrali. In the Assembly, the National Unity Committee was in a meeting. They were also trying to learn the fate of Menderes. Suddenly, news came that EP Chairperson Ragıp Gümüşpala and Secretary General Şinasi Osman wanted to meet with the committee urgently. The committee members did not break the request of their former commander Gümüşpala and made an appointment for 14:30...
In the documentary, the life of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the last period of the Ottoman Empire, the War of Independence and the developments in the first years of the Republic of Turkey are told in parallel. The documentary prepared by Michael Adams consists of recordings made by the BBC in 1970 in Çanakkale, Samsun, Amasya, Sivas and Ankara, as well as historical footage.
A thorough look at the 90's Turkish rock scene, one legendary stage band and its two members: Kerim Capli and Yavuz Cetin... An inquiry of their existential battles with the society, the industry and their own minds.
Turkey's history has been shaped by two major political figures: Mustafa Kemal (1881-1934), known as Atatürk, the Father of the Turks, founder of the modern state, and the current president Recep Tayyıp Erdoğan, who apparently wants Turkey to regain the political and military pre-eminence it had as an empire under the Ottoman dynasty.
Though both the historical and modern-day persecution of Armenians and other Christians is relatively uncovered in the mainstream media and not on the radar of many average Americans, it is a subject that has gotten far more attention in recent years.
Turkey in the 1960s and 1970s was one of the biggest producers of film in the world. In order to keep up with the demand, screenwriters and directors were copying scripts and remaking movies from all over the world. This documentary visits the fastest working directors, the most practical cameramen and the most hardheaded actors to have a closer look into the country's tumultuous history of movie making.
INTENT TO DESTROY embeds with a historic feature production as a springboard to explore the violent history of the Armenian Genocide and legacy of Turkish suppression and denial over the past century.
Societies, like people, have turning points in their histories. These milestones sometimes silently and spontaneously knock on the door, and sometimes they explode like a terrifying thunderclap. The year 1950 was such a turning point for Turkey. A simmering social reaction against 27 years of power erupted in the spring of 1950. Society has cracked its quarter-century shell. Not by shedding blood in the streets, but by voting at the ballot boxes. "Demirkırat" was reared by the general vote. That's why the 14 May 1950 elections were always called the "White Revolution"...
The spring of 1950 was also the spring of the multi-party regime in Turkey. A new 10 years, a new regime, a new government. The first test of democracy was beginning. The National Chief of the single-party period had returned to his Pink Mansion. The address of the opposition was clear now. When it comes to power... Power was shared by a tripartite trivet from the first day: DP Group in the Parliament. Celal Bayar in the Mansion and Adnan Menderes in the Prime Ministry..
In the words of those days, "The first parliament of the Second Republic opened in its new building at 15:00 on a Wednesday. At that moment, the National Unity Committee, which had been ruling the country since 27 May, vanished into history. Now there was an Assembly and a Senate. The old Members of the Committee of National Unity had been "senators of course" for life. The country was finally getting its parliament again after a year and a half hiatus. After many painful days and nights, the biggest share in this success belonged to İsmet İnönü...
Staff Colonel Talat Aydemir... Aydemir's February 22 rebellion was the first revolutionary attempt in Turkey that faced resistance. But it was also the most dangerous... The thing the army feared most happened to him. The most undesirable possibility of the commanders in charge came true and friction broke out between the armies. At that time, the commander of 27 May, Cemal Aga, was appointed to the presidency, but the discomfort did not end. A group led by Colonel Talat Aydemir sought to intervene again. However, a part of the army, especially the Air Force, left Aydemir alone at the last moment. Talat was still strong in Ankara. In order to break this power, Prime Minister İnönü found the formula to dismiss the leaders of the rebel officers and appoint them to the East. Here is February 22, the day when these appointments will be announced to the rebels. The apocalypse was expected that day. And it broke that day...
During the multi-party period in Turkey, no party could achieve the success that the Democrat Party achieved in the 1954 elections. Since those days, no party has been able to repeat the 56 percent of the DP's votes in that election. Now, 93 out of every 100 deputies in the parliament were from the DP. The DP power had reached a heavy and overwhelming majority... Menderes was at the peak of his power and prestige. But as in everything else, the highest point reached in politics was also the point where the descent would begin.
The multi-party democratic regime that we take for granted in Turkey today is actually the product of 23 years of struggle and search. From the establishment of the Republic until 1946, three attempts were made to transition from a single party to a multi-party. The first of these was in 1924. Progressive Republican Party came up against the Republican People's Party that ruled the country. However, this period, when a new republic was built in pain, did not allow an oppositional voice to survive. The Progressive Party was closed after six months. Some of the rulers were imprisoned. Some of them were sentenced on death rows in the case of the assassination of Atatürk.The second attempt was made six months later, in 1930, with the Free Party. But the Free Party survived only 97 days.Finally, after another 16 years, the Democrat Party came in 1946 and the one-party regime became history for Turkey, never to return.
Turkish democracy got over May 27 and March 12 and set off again, but the storm did not subside, and the mutual reckoning was not over. On the contrary, new fronts were opened in the country and blood began to flow like a gutter. Finally, on September 12, there was a knock on the door again. Those who came that day changed everything, everything. Nothing will ever be the same again
It's easy to say... After 23 years of single-party rule, Turkey decided to try democracy once again in 1946. In every attempt up to that time, the regime had been turned upside down and given up in a short time. Now a new one was coming. Would he be able to reach the multi-party regime that has been pursued since Atatürk this time? The calendar of democracy began to run on the morning of Monday, January 7, 1946. That day was a turning point in Turkish political history. The Republic of Turkey woke up with a single party in the morning, it was now multi-party...
Some people have zeros, make big bucks. He becomes rich like the wives. Everyone talks about their money. As long as they are alive, they are always talked about. But then? Then they are forgotten... The idea of talking to you about a completely different person in this documentary. His life is like a history book. It opened its eyes with the Ottomans, took its first steps with the Young Turkish Republic, grew with the growing Turkey, became a giant, but did not show its giantness. He said that if the state exists, I exist too. It has become a symbol, an institution on its own. He writes down the establishment and development process of the Turkish private sector in detail. This person's name is Koçzade Vehbi Efendi...
Working, working, working... Here are the words that make up a contemporary Turkish fairy tale. In fact, this fairy tale is not just the story of one person or a family. It is also the story of a country...
Shots of windows across Croatian coastal towns.
Turkish and Greek islanders talk about their losses and their experience of shifting residences across to the north and to the south post-1974. In this Turkish and Greek Cypriot joint production, Zaim and Chrysanthou deal with extremely sensitive socio-historical material successfully.
During the summer of 2018, hundreds of earthquakes shook the summit of Kiilauea, sparking the volcano's largest eruption in 200 years. To some, it was a disaster. To others, it was the goddess Pele's way of creating new aina (land). The Hawaiian peoples' resilience and cultural unity is a lesson in the true spirit of Aloha.