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CLIMATES
Written & Directed by: Nuri Bilge Ceylan.
Produced by: Zeynep Ozbatur.
Director of Photography: Gokhan Tiryaki.
Edited by: Ayhan Ergursel & Ceylan.
Released by: Zeitgeist.
Country of Origin: Turkey/France. 97 min. Not rated.
Language: Turkish with English subtitles.
With: Ebru Ceylan, Nuri Bilge Ceylan, Nazan Kesal, Mehmet Eryilmaz, Arif Asci, & Can Ozbatur.

Turkey has the largest number of Greco-Roman ruins of any country, and the opening of Climates finds a middle-class Turkish couple wandering among ancient giant pillars with not another soul in sight. Oblivious to the landscape, Bahar’s attention is fixed on Isa (played by the film’s director, Nuri Bilge Ceylan). He photographs the ruins, while she doesn’t let her eyes off of him. In one long take, tears stream down from her fixed stare. With her unflinching intensity and emotional volatility, actress Ebru Ceylan may be a Turkish answer to Isabelle Huppert.

Despite the setting (which will later move to the Mediterranean resort Kas), the viewer is not merely an armchair traveler, but an off-the-court referee. And it is an uneven match. Bahar’s petulant passive-aggressive behavior is on full display during this vacation. At dinner with friends, her simmering and unspoken anger is the pink elephant in the room. Sympathy for the young woman will further erode when she causes a motorcycle accident when she, the passenger, covers the eyes of the driver, Isa, while on the road.

Several months after their torturous tour, the incessant rain of Istanbul has replaced the summer days by the sea. The now-single Isa, a perpetual graduate student still working on his thesis, will be a familiar sort of character nowadays, like Patrick Wilson’s suburban stay-at-home adulterer in Little Children or the more flamboyant duo of Sideways – a man-child who doesn’t know what he wants: freedom or commitment. He still goes home to mom to mend a torn sweater (of course, he doesn’t tell her the tear happened in the heat of passion), and his rapport with a male colleague, Mehmet, reveals a dismissive approach to women that borders on the pedantic. He laughs encouragingly as Mehmet, also middle-aged but with a receding hairline, boasts his prowess in breaking in a girlfriend. As soon as she started wagging her finger at Mehmet, he dumped her, causing her to be apologetic and docile afterwards.

As all of the pieces fall into place, it’s clear why Bahar resents Isa. But she is still barely more than a one-dimensional, angry cipher. Even though the camera is almost in the actors’ faces with every gulp and cigarette intake audible, the viewer is still kept at bay by the suffocatingly muted performances (played be a real life couple) and the minimal dialogue. Silence means everything in their interactions. Throughout the long static takes, the viewer is self-consciously an observer, and despite the display of emotions (mostly Bahar sobbing), the viewing experience is emotionally barren. What we’re seeing is the splintering of a relationship; its initial connection remains elusive. And what is apparent from their rapport isn’t exactly complex or as engaging as the director’s last film, Distant, a film of a similar pace and rhythm, where a country bumpkin crashes with his bourgeoisie Istanbul cousin. The director’s new effort lacks Distant’s more delineated characters with pointed and contrasting interactions. As a result, Climates, an austere French-and-Turkish coproduction, is the stereotypical cornerstone of a film festival, but not the type of art film that is likely to play in Van let alone in Van Nuys. Kent Turner
October 27, 2006