The Wild Pear Tree, written by Akin Aksu, Ebru Ceylan and Nuri Bilge Ceylan, directed by the latter - 10 out of 10

The Wild Pear Tree, written by Akin Aksu, Ebru Ceylan and Nuri Bilge Ceylan, directed by the latter

10 out of 10

The Wild Pear Tree is one of the most complex, intriguing, philosophical, though provoking, rewarding and worthwhile films you can watch, nominated for the most important cinematic prize, The Palme D’Or at the 2018 Cannes Film Festival.

Cinephiles have learned to expect masterpieces from the Turkish genius, Nuri Bilge Ceylan, nominated for an outstanding fourteen awards at the aforementioned Cannes Film Festival, over the years winning the Palme d’Or, the Grand Prize of the jury and Best Director twice

Winter Sleep, winner of the 2014 Palme d’Or, Once Upon a Time in Anatolia, awarded the Grand Prize of the Jury in 2011, and Three Monkeys, for which the now iconic Ceylan has won the Best Director in 2008 join the list of best motion pictures ever made http://realini.blogspot.com/2017/11/note-on-three-monkeys-director-nuri.html

The Wild Pear Tree is so challenging and long, at 3 hours and 8 minutes, that viewers might need to see it again, the under signed looked at the passages dealing with literature and religion twice, given that there are so many hidden messages, scenes where one explanation might be suggested, but it could be something different:

What was the significance of that child, with face and body covered by ants, which have also invaded the body of Idris Karasu, when he rests but appears to be dead – and it looks like his son is ready to abandon – seeing as he lay in the shade of one of the wild trees in the first place, but he is now under the open sky, under the scorching sun – then there is the image of the hero hanging from a rope, which could be interpreted as a dream – like so many of the other peculiar scenes in the film – or an indication that he is considering suicide.

The protagonist is Sinan Karasu, a young man who has just graduated and has to pass an exam to become a teacher, if he gets good results he may get to work in the more prosperous, cultured West, or take a position in the less favored East of the country, but he is most concerned with his writing and publishing The Wild Pear Tree, his first book as a writer.

The young hero is in a perpetual conflict with his father, Idris Karasu, albeit there is a chance that they would bury the hatchet – the son is the one who at times appears to hate his parent –and become close again, after the aggravation caused by the gambling habit of the older man, also a teacher, who has seen his reputation destroyed by his addiction, for which he has sold his house and he has eventually lost all credibility with family and most villagers.

At one point, his son comes to the classroom where he teaches and tells him the electricity has been cut off, for unpaid bills, and mother asks for the money to have it restored, but Idris Karasu states that the money have not come through, only to see he is not believed and furthermore, his son tells his mother that he was completing some form of betting forms, when in fact he was drawing posters for the missing dog that Sinan appears to have chased away, in one of his vicious moods.

The main character has so many sides as to make him one of the most complicated figures in cinema, for apart from his talent as a writer, curious, creative, investigative, brilliant mind, he can be villainous with his father, unforgiving of his past sins that may be amended for, aggressive in some of his interactions with a local writer and then with two imams.

The conversations with writer and religious figures are among the highlights of this motion picture, which does not lack though provoking themes and dialogues, for when facing, later challenging the established author Suleyman, some of the core questions of writing are exposed, if literature has its heart in language at the contact between pen and paper, the frustrations of authors who are reluctant to face readers, the assertion made by Suleyman that it is not what happens, but how one writes about it that counts, seems logical, but it is explored further, when he says that he makes the preparations, bakes the bread and readers eat it.

Sinan meets with Imam Nazmi and Imam Veysel and another intriguing interaction deals with religious issues, from the tendency that people have to gibe too much weight to gold, to the need to have faith as the only alternative, manner of approaching the fundamental teachings, to on of the less known companions of the prophet Mohamed and the fact that some people go down paths of less significance, bringing in less popular characters to make artificial points.

Imam Nazmi rebukes the lesser known figures of the Koran, explaining that people quote the most relevant ones, anyway he seems to favor an approach that does not question the holy teachings, while Sinan argues for individual responsibility, disliking the paradigm in which options are “given on a plate” as he puts it, he would be the one with a more introspective, meditative, questioning mind, prompting the imam to ask him if he would rather live in a world with Allah, or without him and when the answer is yes, he presents the vision of a life of submission, for we are anyway fish in a barrel or words to that effect.

Apart from the erudite, seraphic, high minded, celestial, cultured, esoteric, metaphysical, aerial talks, entreaties of the film there are more mundane aspects, wherein Imam Nazmi is presented as a rather duplicitous cleric, for he travels to ceremonies that could be seen as parties and uses the grandfather Recep as prop, for the old man used to be an imam himself, but he is so old now that he needs help to dress and the family is worried that he may bungle the service which he keeps as a replacement, a tool for Nazmi and then villagers would laugh and this would be dishonorable.

The village is seen as a wasteland by the hero and the young woman he meets in the first part, who also wants to go away, but would be forced into an arranged matrimony, not before she kisses Sinan with such passion, remorse, envy or all of them and more combined that she bites his lip, that would stay wounded throughout this marvelous picture.

Books will surely be written about this chef d’oeuvre, so rich in significance, symbols, and questions that a short note would not do it any justice, except if it encourages others to see it and somehow is successful at making them interested and curious.