User Reviews

This film won the Grand Prix in Cannes, and it was deserved. A team goes into the countryside to find the body of a murder victim. The team includes the two men accused of the murder,one of whom has confessed and says he wills show them where they buried the body, the police chief, prosecutor, doctor, diggers, and guards. As the night drags on into the next day and the body is not found, the men grow more and more tired. Much of the film is beautifully shot in the dark or semi-dark, lit only by the headlights of the cars or a lamp in the village where they stop to rest. The filming is slow, showing the beautiful countryside and vignettes that wonderfully shed light on the different characters. What seems to be a simple task grows more and more complex; everything in the movie turns out to be more complicated than it first seems. Everyone seems to be guilty of something, so the film becomes a question not only of will the body be found, but who is guilty of what?

One could say that the film is too slow, but just as the team grows more and more tired, so arewe as the viewers, participating in the fatigue of the team, drawn into the feelings of the characters. Women and children are present only as lovely cameos in the film, but are behind almost everything. The actors are all superb, and it was amazing to me that Ceylan could show such depth and breadth of character and emotion and drama with only a few lines of dialog and amazing closeups of the faces.

I think this is the best movie of 2011 so far. A very different, but brilliantly conceived three part police procedural that is really a character study of two men and how they each deal with the past. In many ways, I had a similar experience here to what I have when I read a really good novel. The characters are rich and complex, often funny, and thoroughly believable. Nothing is crammed down the audience's throat, yet there is so much detail and nuance that it becomes easy to see the two men for the basically good, complex people they are. This is a movie that respects the audience's intelligence. It is also a movie that is easily among the best shot and edited of the year. In fact, it is hard to think of a single thing that I would suggest to improve the film. I have seen other Ceylan films, but nothing of his has ever had the depth, nuance and humanity of this one.

Anatolia, simply the rest of Turkey other than Istanbul. It is a place where the hospitality is served as the only gift with respect and honor. The fascinating thing is to see such sort of story which takes place in this land of world where hundreds of nations have existed and vanished throughout the history, by a magnificent director, Nuri Bilge Ceylan. I can understand people who have harsh criticism about these kind of arts so called as ''film-noir''. It may seem too slow or simply lack of action or someone can even question how other people can enjoy by watching so called cliché ' a man looking beyond the horizons all along the movie'. The point is no body has to like this sort of art. For instance it is like reading a book. Consider some pages of a book when there is no action but the author speaks instead of the hero of the book. So by watching ' a man looking beyond the horizons' makes me question what he could think or makes me put myself in the middle of the situation. And I really feel like I am that guy in the movie. But I really really and really feel like I am that guy, when the movie is so perfectly directed and so perfectly portrayed.

We can call this movie as a bridge or as a milestone in Ceylan's career. It is as simple as that, there is a very obvious change in Ceylan's directing and writing after seeing that movie. Having seen that, we can make this comparison like Before or After Once upon a Time in Anatolia. It is not 'three monkeys' or 'the climates' or 'the distant', it is obviously another one that carries Nuri Bilge Ceylan's way of directing to the next level.

Another must see...

A dark cold night over the Turkish steppes, an entourage of police detectives, a commissioner, a doctor, and two grim prisoners in tow search for a dead body for over 2 hours in the darkest part of the night. What appears to be a good setup for the latest police procedural, crime fiction, thriller, even midnight horror turns out unexpected intensely revealing character portraits, in a most exhaustive and surprisingly humorous way. Recreating his earlier slow burn meditations, yet with a new sense of maturity "Anatolia" is true to the real rhythms of night, the frustrations of waiting for the crucial evidence to appear, the vagueness of memory, remembrance of traumatic events in love and in murder and the bleakness of night of the eternal night and unwelcome truths revealed by the day.

One senses the tedium and frustration of the murder investigation, simultaneously the dread and anticipation of revealing the dead body in it's gory realism, the salacious details resulting in the murder itself and the public crucification of the culprits Anatolia however is almost an antithesis to the psychological revelations over the course of the night.

Before (and if) we reach the major discovery, the police officers and commissar reveal their aversions to murder, mortality, the search for a guilty suspect before the evidence is revealed, their cultural differences, assumptions about class differences, marriage, and human nature. Throughout the eternal stillness of night, poetic treatises about life, death and love are superimposed over cracks of thunder, howling winds and pattering rains, the harsh spotlight of car headlamps contrast with the comforting glow of a flickering lantern on a village porch.

The search is tedious and frustrating for both the officers and the audience, as much as the motives are unclear, like love, life, and marriage. The ambiguity of night is as unclear as the motives for murder, does daybreak reveal anything revelatory, and does the dissection of a murder case hours and days after its uncovering reveal any truth into it's motives or human nature itself?

The audience should be wiser against the small town working-class police task-force just following orders; they may empathise more with the reflective and sensitive Doctor Cemal or the cunning and charismatic Prosecutor Nusret, yet under the surface, their own personal lives in marriage and children are vexed, the investigation is almost a respite from these frustrations. The commissioner seems haunted by his ill wife, yet on the surface, this is treated as a running joke, later, it reveals thematic links to the search for answers in the unknown murder case. Similarly the doctor tries to make peace with his conscience about a past personal relationship. The impression of him is the most sensible, grounding the moral compass, yet his flaws are also revealed by daylight.

Contrasts between these characters and the murder suspect who appears (at least on the surface) to be more emotionally stable than many of the prosecutors is complex and kaleidoscopic. This is a remarkable introspective film ostensibly exploring a murder case and therefore guilt and conscience, yet further introspection reveals riffs on love story(ies), female roles, family, honour, class prejudice and the legal system.

Women appear seldom in the film, some wives are talked about yet, their effect on the men (and audience) is haunting, magnetic, and enigmatic. The small towns which they stop at along their road trip are barren, simple, country-like, impressing the sense of isolation both physically and more saliently, emotionally. The appearance of women and children in these towns is revelatory and thirst-quenching. Therefore a lot of time spent for introspection and meditation, watching how the characters reacting to the tedium, stress, fatigue and mortality of a long hard night.

The terrain of Anatolia is a foreboding character in itself with it's rolling fields illuminated by the sharp piercing car headlights slicing the night like snippets revealed about each character - yet the whole picture remains hidden. A storm is sensed coming both literally and figuratively, the expectant howling winds like ghosts of the dead and the memories of the characters across the unforeseeable terrain. The mood is incredibly poetic, rhythmically blending with the sounds of the whistling winds, the crunch of icy gravel, pattering of rain, and fluttering pigeons, all in the emptiness of night.

Nuri Bilge Ceylan's previous films have been sombre (frustrations) meditations on human nature, such as the brewing storm in 3 Monkeys, the solitude of cascading snow and the cracking waves of the harbour in Distant, to the scorching blistering summer in Climates; environment and mood work in integration in his work. In "Anatolia", the moods over the windy plains are as intense as the brewing moods in the characters.

The scenes of the cars rolling across the plains lit only by the headlights occupy the initial part of the film. They run almost in real time; with the wind whipping though grass and plains they form a stark, haunting and grim atmosphere. There are bravura haunting scenes like the rolling apple down the hill, whilst initially seemingly superfluous, yet curious it's implications to reveal characters' current moods and eventual outcomes. And the the colloquial dinner at the mayor house under the swaying candlelight, then in pitch darkness, the light revealing (literally) different shades of each character; they the revelation (apparition) of a miraculous figure moments later is spellbinding.

This is cinema with the highest respect for the audience, yet Ceylan has said that he wants to bore the audience, "because out of boredom might come a miracle - maybe days later, maybe years." Not sure whether to take this seriously however what it does demonstrate is a greater onus on viewer to think actively about the story and the consequences; out of deep reflection perhaps may come a revelation about the characters and ourselves.

Ceylan's films always get criticized for being too slow, and yes, they are slower, sometimes much slower, than what the flickering-advertisement generation is used to today. In Turkey, he is heavily criticized for being "too artsy," inaccessible, and boring. I, on the other hand, marvel at how non-Turkish audiences can actually watch and like his films; it speaks volumes for his brilliant talent in making something so foreign and different a universal piece for everyone to appreciate. The untranslatable colloquial language, the lives of people in remote parts of Turkey with petty worries, a murder investigation that happen in snail pace, the local politics of small, mud-brick villages all become accessible. Combined with his impeccable sense of cinematography and some stellar performances, especially from Yilmaz Erdogan, whom we are more used to seeing in comedic roles, the film shines.

Why a 7/10, then? Well, I have seen all of Ceylan's films. They all execute the story arc well. They do not have Hollywood endings where everything is neatly resolved, of course, but they usually have some progress and movement through the arc. Somehow, this film lacked that. I felt like the main story arc was not fulfilled. I cannot really explain it; perhaps it was that too many things were left untold, or some "hints" were too vague and just when you thought they will lead somewhere, they didn't? Nevertheless, Once Upon a Time in Anatolia is another cinematic gem from the Turkish master. Highly recommended for those who do not have to have action packed scenes and formula-bound stories to enjoy a film.

Nuir Bilge Ceylon's "Once Upon a Time in Anatolia" is the complete antithesis to the conventional American crime drama, which routinely features detectives with matinée-idol looks, an assortment of plot twists and red herrings, and a series of breath-bating car chases to keep the masses from bolting for the exits.

"Once Upon a Time in Anatolia" has none of these. In fact, it features a cast of balding, sagging, middle-aged men - a police chief, a prosecutor, a doctor and two murder suspects - who have gone on a night- long search, through the dour planes of Turkey, in search of a buried body. As the night drags on, the men engage in a series of long, angst- ridden conversations that reveal how their constant exposure to and intimate involvement with the sordid and depraved aspects of the human condition have made them pessimistic and cynical about life. Yet, in the end, at least one of the characters finds a way, through a bit of professional compromise, to bring a little less darkness into the world.

Meanwhile, at every step in the drama, the movie drains the process of crime detection of all its "glamour."

It's a long - 157-minutes long, in fact - methodical, and frequently ponderous journey into the heart of darkness, but fine performances and a complete lack of conventionality make it a trip worth taking.

This is a terrific film. The cinematography is brilliant, fabulous. The acting is excellent. The dialogue is very natural, sometimes very funny (as in the subtitle quote in the heading of this review) sometimes philosophical, but always drawing us into the story and the lives of the characters.

There is a mystery within a mystery., one I understood in the end, the other I am not so sure about - but being left in doubt did not leave me disappointed but rather it left me liking the film even more.

This is an incredibly rich viewing experience even though it depicts relatively impoverished living standards.

It can hardly be called action packed but it is extremely engaging because of how beautifully it is filmed and how well it is written.

I've just watched Once Upon a Time in Anatolia. Very courageous naming after Sergio Leone's masterpieces. But definitely it deserves that.

Nuri Bilge Ceylan has always been one of my living cinema idols. I know many young people in Turkey inspired by his cinema, and wanted to make their own films. He has affected a whole generation of new filmmakers, both in and outside Turkey. Not because he won a Grand Prix in Cannes with his film Distant that he shot with 3-4 people of crew, but because we can actually feel the essence of cinema in his films.

I think these are enough to tell you about my admiration to him. But this film I've watched tonight was a true surprise for me. Its his best work so far, and was very pleasant to watch in spite of its long runtime.

To me, its one of the achievements in the world cinema in the last few years.

Unlike to his previous films, I see real mastery this time. He was not experimenting , not learning to direct, not trying to make a good movie out of nothing, but was exactly knowing what he does.

The acting was superb. All the leading actors had great performances. As a guy from Turkey I can say that every single moment was so much real.

All these tensions in real life situations and the subtle humor in the background. I think it has the true value of NBC's films.

For a film lover there there are some films in the world, always made by some exceptional directors, that shows you the true beauty of cinema. These are not average art-house films, nor anything you watch for having some good time. These films are more like some religious rituals or spiritual experience. Not because they are mystical or having some spiritual moments, but just because they respect cinema so much and make it a sacred art form.

This film was one of those rare films that reminds me why I love cinema that much..

This film is first of all very beautiful in sceneries and cinematography, the latter by Gokhan Tiryaki. It's an existential film that uses the searching for a corpse, which will last one night, to tell a universal story about the misery of men in their lives and societies, and the dirt behind their small poor lives. That contasts with the beauty and immensity of landscape that's behind what's happening. The characters are masterfully described, also thanks to the beautiful closeups (and the very good actors, of course). This misery of the human events seems to contrast also with the women of the film, who are only two (it seems really a film of men) and who appear to be deeply dignified, innocent and angelic (same for the child).

I came across this movie after a lot of research and spending a lot of time. When i read the reviews, the expectations were high. The movie started very well and built up a lot of expectations on what will unfold.

Lot of time had passed and we were still on character building. The movie shows great attention to details on every scene for every character other than the accused I felt. Great cinematography and acting and thats it. I was hoping for a twist or something to happen next as it was thriller genre movie. The movie then just ends leaving everything open ended.

I just watched this at the Melbourne Film Festival, I found it quite good. It terms of narrative it was quite a mysterious journey for the audience, the audience as the picture began were in the dark and begun discovery the means of the story non-overtly. This sometimes works and sometimes doesn't, But that of course applies to all forms of narrative may it be Barry Lyndon where you know the fate of Barry but are still enthralled with the story or a movie such as this, some of the audience (Many people left the theatre through the course of the film) can feel tedious with this approach accompanied with various long Tarkovsky-esque takes, however I think it was quite interesting, it's as if a camera just accompanied this search of the everyday case of a local Turkish law enforcement. I had some preconceptions about the film, I thought it was going to be quite stark and gloomy, in the likes of No Country For Old Men (Which is a brilliant film), however it proved to have a myriad of scenes with humour and it acted like a beacon of light for the sombre setting the movie is placed in. This movie had some amazing cinematography, great lighting of the night scenes, only lit by the headlights of the cars and some great shots really capturing the audience. I think the film lacked a score, if I were the director I would have put in a very ambiance oriented score like in Tarkovsky's Solaris, to really unsettle the viewer because it really would strengthen the ambiguity experienced by the characters and audience alike. This film was quite good, yes it is a slow burner, but I think the strangeness of the story and it's concealed nature manages to outweigh it's tediosity. 8/10 from me.

To enjoy Once Upon A Time In Anatolia, the viewer must enjoy policework, in a sense: reading people, making observations, drawing inferences. It is not a film for the passive viewer that wants to be stimulated, entertained. The work is masterful and deserves the acclaim.

First of all I have to admit I never saw any film by Director Ceylan before 'Once Upon a Time in Anatolia'. But was I ever glad that I stumbled onto this remarkable film. His work will be on my radar screen from now on.

At over 150 minutes, and with little action and practically no musical score, this film may appear long for many. However, it had my attention for the entire length of the film. My interest to know more about each individual that formed the search party (the party was out trying to locate a dead body in the countryside at night), the stories behind each one of them, and what was beyond the obvious collectively glued me to the screen. Acting was first rate by all. Camera work was artistic and competent. Watching the film was like reading an interesting book in candle light - your eyes are strained but you still want to come to the end.

My only complaint is a good part of my attention was allocated to reading the subtitles, which can be fast at times, so I could not focus 100% on the acting and the images. To remedy that I had to watch it for a second time. I also share the sentiment from some reviewers on one particular scene - the emergence of the village head's young daughter to serve tea to all these weary male bodies, and the reaction by each as they looked up onto her kind and angelic face in surprise. This scene was very well timed and well done.

In summary, serious fan of international cinema should not miss this film. It is worth everyone of the 150+ minutes of your life.

Once Upon a Time in Anatolia is an award winning motion picture directed by Turkish movie maker Nuri Bilge Ceylan. Once Upon a Time in Anatolia is essentially a Police Procedural that also serves to highlight the complexities associated with the Human Psyche. Once Upon a Time in Anatolia serves to be a case study on how humans behave, especially when made to step out of the comfort zone. The world of cinema today finds itself at the crossroads. In a bid to satiate the ever growing demands of the money mongering business moguls the creative aspects of cinema are often forced to take a back seat. The commercialization is not new to cinema, and is something that cannot be done away with. After all, everyone has the right to eke out a living. However, what is worrying is that the business sharks that rule the movie arena merely treat cinema as a money making instrument. This naked opportunism is not only undermining the efforts of the great visionaries of cinema who had nurtured cinema with their blood and sweat, but is also posing a great treat to its evolution as an Art form. Over the years, cinema has been undergoing a continuous transformation from being a mere medium of indulgence to being a profound means of self-realization to being a tool to generate the moolah, but in the process it has seemed to lost its golden glory.

With the Japanese, Swedish, Italian, and Russian Cinema having lost their true vigor, and the Anglo-American Cinema already on the verge of no return, the onus truly lies with the Iranian, Korean, Argentine, and Turkish Cinema to be the beacon of cinema's hope of survival as an Art form. As far as the contemporary Turkish Cinema is concerned, it's synonymous with the name of one Nuri Bilge Ceylan. Ceylan, undoubtedly, is one of the greatest movie makers of our time, and his singularly evocative style not only makes his work poignant and thought-provoking, but, I dare say, also puts him in the same league as Kurosawa and Tarkovsky.

Ceylan delivered a punch with his stunning family tragedy 'Three Monkeys' in 2008. He incredibly manages an encore with his latest flick, the brutal yet brilliant, Once Upon a Time in Anatolia. Once Upon a Time in Anatolia is Ceylan's finest achievement till date, and has already earned him some fine accolades including the coveted Grand Prix at Cannes. The two 'Once Upon a Time' movies by Sergio Leone were indeed masterpieces and this is no less, at least one in the making that is expected to withstand the test of the time. Just like with Leone, Ceylan's camera does all the talking with the dialogue itself taking the back seat. Even in its subsidiary role, the dialogue never loses its weight and packs the punch whenever the need arises. The laconicism in dialogue is well substituted by the cinematographic detail, which forms the backbone of Ceylan's work. The panoramic shots of the Anatolian Steppes are highly reminiscent of Leone's widescreen cinematography in the 'Dollars Trilogy'. The latent wilderness of the Anatolian Steppes is greatly analogous to the secrets that lay hidden in the hearts of the deeply convoluted characters. The movie also offers a great insight into the complex procedure adopted by the police to solve murder cases, and the role of autopsy in estimating the actual cause of death.

Once Upon a Time in Anatolia acquaints the viewer with the dark side of human psyche. The stark beauty symbolizes the pain—that the characters have experienced right through their lives—which has robbed their inner peace and beauty, and has made them ugly and brutal. The murder mystery that lies at the very core of the plot is just one small part of a highly complex puzzle that has much more to it than meets the eye. The plot allows each character's caricature to have multiple layers, a facet that adds great depth to the movie, and makes second viewing absolutely essential. The Driver, the Police Commissioner, the Prosecutor, the Accused, and the Doctor, who at first come across as run-of-the-mill characters of the quotidian, are in actuality bearers of deeply eccentric personas, victimized by the vicissitudes of fate, stuck in the middle of nowhere, waiting desperately for their eventual doom.

One very unique feature of the movie is the striking yet consistent difference that exists between what the characters try to project, and what actually is going inside their diabolical minds, something that only the viewer is made aware of, but not always. The night scenes in the first half of the movie are absolutely astonishing to watch. The cavalcade of cars moving ahead in the pitch black darkness, made visible by the projection of their head lights, is symbolic of hope amidst abject distress when everything is lost and there's is no place to run or hide.

The scene that's my absolute favorite, and that each and every time leaves me completely speechless and awestruck, is the one in which the Mayor's seraphic daughter serves tea to the guests with her pristine, entrancing beauty stimulating a sense of delirium not only in minds of the guests, but also in minds of the viewers. Her piety and pulchritude is incorruptible to such an extent that it has the power to purge the evil that resides in others. The divine glow of her angelic face under the lamp light is worth the luminosity of a million stars in the Universe.

Overall, Once Upon a Time in Anatolia is a fine specimen of movie-making that elevates contemporary cinema to new heights, both as an Art form as well as a medium of entertainment. The movie's multilayered plot and complex characters make second and probably a third viewing absolutely essential for a deeper and clearer understanding. 9/10

My daughter and I both agreed on this one before and after watching it: beforehand we were both interested in the story as advertised and that it won at Cannes, after seeing it we both consigned it to the Art Too Clever For Me dustbin. This is a motion picture not a painting, right?

Cops get thug to show them where murdered man is buried in various wildernesses, with a childish intermittent subplot interrupting at random. Nothing wrong with that, but also rambling, lazily incoherent, overlong, pretentious with an undisciplined end spring to mind. Well acted with great cinematography, however so many Arty longueurs abound, stretching the film out almost as long the Anatolian horizons. Whereas Kurosawa or even Bergman could mean something with apparent pointless plotlessness this utterly fails. It needed a Kurosawa to inject some life, some interest. After 2 hours or so I realised I wasn't the slightest bit interested in any of the characters, their stories or surroundings, but only to make it to the end of its long and winding road to complete it, press delete and log off. A totally well made unmoving 2D experience.

On the other hand, the first 45 minutes were OK with some atmospheric scenes, that is before you guess that this particular football match is going to end up goalless. It slowed down disastrously after the cop stopped asking Huh. I suspect most of the comments here have made by men, as the "beautiful daughter" who appears for about 10 minutes and who does nothing is mentioned a lot - by people desperate for something memorable to relate? So-called realism abounds, however were all the schlurpy sounds at the laidback autopsy really necessary? You'll need to make up your own mind but to my mind this is Artifice, not Art; or like watching paint drying, not admiring a colourful canvas. Oh well, you win some you lose some.

Tags like a cop movie, police drama, detective thriller, murder mystery are absolutely misleading here. This film is none of the above. The ongoing police investigation is just a background of the portrayal of life in a provincial Turkish town and rural areas around it. This life is dreary, dull and boring but Ceylan shows it so masterfully you are totally captivated by the narrative. The people are talking dreary, dull and boring things but those are their everyday matters. There's no grandiloquence, no prettification, no message, no hidden meaning, only Ceylan's perfect realism, his trademark. For completists - the prosecutor's story about his wife committing suicide is borrowed from a Chekhov's short story The Examining Magistrate

¨You can say, once upon a time in Anatolia when I was working out in the sticks I remember this one night which began like this.¨

Once Upon a Time in Anatolia is a beautiful film with some breathtaking cinematography, a great use of long shots, and a combination of dark sceneries lighted by vehicles or candles. The story is also interesting and intriguing at times with some memorable characters, but the film also dragged and moved real slowly which made it a difficult watch. Despite the beautiful scenes my eyes were dozing off during this two and a half hour long movie. This isn't a film for everyone because it is long and slow, but also very artistic. There are a lot of symbolisms introduced in the movie as well, and the fact that the movie is so slow is kind of purposely done so in such a way that the viewer gets to feel and experience how the night is taking its toll on the characters who are suffering from a hard day's work and fatigue. Once Upon a Time in Anatolia is directed by Turkish director, Nuri Bilge Ceylan (who also made Distinct and Climates), who co-wrote the film with Ebru Ceylan and Ercan Kesal. Their film received a lot of love from the critics and it also won the Jury Grand Prize in the 2011 Cannes Film Festival. I had no clue about this movie until I heard several critics include it as their favorite film of 2012 in their midyear lists. I can see why it received so much love, because it was really beautiful and artistic, but I also can see why many people will hate this film because it's just way too long and moves so slow. It becomes tedious to watch this film and you begin to feel as tired as the characters are.

The film is basically a police procedural as we join a caravan of three cars driving through the rural area of Anatolia on their way to recover a dead body somewhere in the valley. Two brothers, Kenan (Firat Tanis) and Ramazan (Burhan Yildiz) have confessed to the crime and are trying to point out to the police where they have buried the body. Prosecutor Nusret (Taner Bisel), the Police Commissioner Naci (Yilmaz Erdogan), and Doctor Cemal (Muhammet Uzuner) are leading the search along with a couple of officers, guards, and the driver Arab Ali (Ahmet Taylan). What seemed a simple search is turning out to be a long and tedious one as Kenan can't recall the exact location of the place where he has buried the body. He claims to have been drunk the night he killed the victim and buried him. As the hours go by and the officials become impatient the night begins to take its toll on everyone. During the search we get to know each one of the characters through a series of dialogues between each other. Some of these dialogues and stories they tell are actually more interesting than the things that are going on. The film depicts the police procedural with a lot of details and in a realistic fashion.

Despite almost falling asleep with this long movie, I have to admit I was intrigued with what was going on and loved how the film was shot with such beautiful sceneries. It was hard to grade this film because it is truly memorable and original, but at the same time it feels so tedious that you just want to give up on it. The ending is also very unsatisfying as I was expecting something more climatic or revealing considering how long we had to wait for it. On the other hand the film does leave a lot of interpretations available and will have you thinking about some of the things that happened. The film revolves around men mostly, and there are very few scenes with women in it, but they do play an important role every time they show up on screen. There are a lot of hidden symbolisms behind several scenes and that is what allows the viewer to have different interpretations of what might have happened. Muhammet Uzuner as the Doctor gives the best performance in the film and the rest of the cast was also pretty strong. I didn't have a great time with this film and wouldn't consider it among my favorite movies of the year, but it was interesting and barely got a passing grade for me.

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With the possible exception of Malick's The Tree of Life, this is the best new film I have seen for several years (after three viewings). It certainly grows on one enormously. It is a very contemplative meditation on mortality; most of the conversations concern that in one way or another. And the characters are really changed after the night's events. The film is stunning to watch, with strong echoes of the Iranian films of Kiarostami (the fruit rolling downhill, the long-shots of winding hillside roads, etc.). Echoes also of Tarkovsky (whom Ceylan admires, and has quoted in earlier films). Strongly recommended for anyone with reasonable attention-spans.

The Turkish drama film can look boring in the first viewing but displays the magic of filmmaking. Actually we go through astonishingly few things during the entire 2:30 hours' time. This is what may bore you. There are long scenes of the cast just chatting. Car is moving through the desert type area. We hear what is going on inside that. The story is about a person convicted of murder, who takes the police along with him to the site of action. More than half portion of the film is spent in this ride. The motive of the film does not seem to be clear enough to me till the end. It is meant to touch the subjects of psychology. And that is why you have to be too much concentrated while watching the film. It is not meant for an average film lover. Also it is highly unlikely that teenagers will understand much and appreciate what had been envisioned in the film. So, basically the film is made for people with a high level of maturity. You cannot expect the same fun and frolic with this film as you found in other films of the same title (Once upon in Mexico, Mumbai, West).

PROS:

During the entire show you will feel a touch of Abbas kiarostami. There are long takes in which car is moving which made me remember of Taste of Cherry (1997). Camera is placed inside the car to have even more close interaction with the people. While the technique seems boring but I believe this is the best norm to display the emotions relating some psychological talks. What you need to know is that this film is not made for entertainment but to pause at certain moments and ponder about the last statement. The thoughts, talks, beliefs all are worth thinking once. There are very few elements that belong to the category of an adrenaline rush film. Like the number of twists in the film are very few. But the biggest twist which is not the primary one is revealed in the end. And that is revealed in a way that will make you pause for a moment and think of human nature. Among a substantial number of characters, I found that only a few were actually revealed easily to the viewer. Others are meant to be deciphered by you. Sit down and think for another two hours or so. Also the good thing is that there is no set protagonist for the film. And this keeps on changing. First I felt that the policeman is the main character but then the prosecutor comes in a bigger role and finally the doctor seemed to be dominating. At some point of time you even sympathize with the convicted murderer. There is not much soundtrack but then it was not even necessary. I liked the locations very much.

CONS:

It does not have any negative points as such but I couldn't find the story intriguing enough. And that is what might make you have a negative opinion about the film. But then considering the fact that the film was actually made for ruminating on some questions about human nature, I can say that many of us would take time to understand the league of these films.

MESSAGE: Still working on deciphering.

VERDICT: "Watch if you are mature enough."

"Few films are about simply waiting and talking, but this is one..." Quoting a Guardian review, the guy nonetheless gives high marks.

But that's it, its about waiting and the boring little life moments that cinema usually spares us. This movie almost extinguished my will to live. It's well made, clear style, beautifully shot etc. etc. but it's HORRIBLY boring.

I'm into slow or macabre stuff if it works (Bergman, Kaurismaki...) but there is a deafening sense of pointlessness to the too long scenes in this thing. All the rave reviews make me suspicious of nefarious motives (pretentious snobbery).

I had high expectations due to misleading trailer. Avoid it! Or at least don't pay to see it!