One of the great
things about attending an International Film Festival it that you meet people
who you would not normally cross your path. Sitting next to me while I was
watching Alejandro Fernandes powerful Chilean drama To Kill A Man (2014) was a very attractive young film director from
Turkey her name was Azra Deniz Okyay. She was born in Istanbul in 1983 and
spent most of her childhood in Asia. After graduating from Lycée Français Pierre Loti she completed her
Cinematography BA and MA in Paris at the Sorbonne-Nouvelle. She interned for a
while at Paris Partizan, an advertising and video production company and then
worked for a year and a half at Premiere-Heure as a Junior Art Director. Her
body of work to date consists of videos and short films all of which have mainly
been shot between Paris and Istanbul. Her latest award winning short
film Little
Black Fish (2013) was having its UK Premiere at the Edinburgh
International Film Festival as part of a programme of short films called
collectively City and Wilderness.
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| Filming on the streets of Paris. |
This is a movie inspired by true stories. Part documentary,
part fiction it involves three women, Maral an illegal Armenian who is living
and working in Turkey, Ela (played by Azra Deniz Okyay) who is trying desperately
to stay in Paris and Julia (Camille De Sablet) a French woman who wants to
develop her career as a photo-journalist. The film opens with Ela being chased through
the streets by immigration officials and appears to escape by jumping into the Seine.
We then go back in time where we learn something about Maral, who is a
qualified nurse. Because of the lack of employment and the low pay she has left
Armenia and travelled to Turkey to try and find work. Living in constant fear
of arrest because of her illegal status she has not seen her mother or brother
for 12 years. We then move back to France where we find Ela dressed as a clown
working the Champs Elysees handing out flyers for a circus. Ela shares a flat
with Julia who takes her portfolio to a photojournalist company but is told
that her ‘local’ photo’s are not what is required instead she is told to find a
war zone like Gaza, risk life and limb and take some ‘real’ photos. She retorts
that she will attend the Armenian – Turkey football match, a war zone in its
self, and present the company with a photo-story. Ela sets out to get her
resident permit extended, but its out of date along with the rest of her
paperwork! Maral in the meantime has had
all her hard earned savings stolen that she was going to send home to her
family.
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| Director, writer and producer Azra Deniz Okyay. |
Financed by
generous friends and group funding It’s neither Turkish, French nor Armenian
its simple an ‘immigrant’ film. Azra Deniz’s, who as well as acting and
directing, wrote and produced the film, describes her project as one that’s
meant to highlight immigration problems and to bring attention to the
Turkish-Armenian debate. A film I perceive to be about how
bureaucracy which can cruelly put an end to people’s hopes and dreams. The
soundtrack is un-intrusive, the movie is superbly cut and edited, it holds your
attention and succeeds in showing how ordinary hard working citizens of the
world are touched by circumstances completely outside of there control. Azra Deniz Okyay has a great feel for her
subject matter and makes you think twice before making the term ‘illegal
immigrant’ sound like an expletive.
‘The little fish live
in a little lake. It must be in a big lake so it can grow’[1].
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