Dönersen Islık Çal

Analysis of The Movie “Dönersen Islık Çal”:

Diversity in Cultural Identities and Intolerance in Turkey

Title of Film: Dönersen Islık Çal

Year: 1992

Director: Orhan Oğuz

Actors/Actresses: Mevlüt Demiryay, Fikret Kuşkan, Derya Alabora, Menderes Samancılar

Genre: Drama

Script: Nuray Oğuz, Cemal San

(taken from http://tr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dönersen_Islık_Çal_(film))

In places where diversity exists, it’s not a hard task to find a proof of the existence of issues relating to gender, race, ethnicity and many more. Diversity, by nature, draws attention to dissimilarities among individuals, which are numerous and which usually don’t mean anything in terms of functioning in daily life. These differences begin to obtain certain meanings in social contexts depending on the main characteristics of the majority population. Any feature standing out or diverging from the “standard”, fails to fit into the society in most cases. There are of course, multicultural societies that have struggled with intolerance towards differences through many years and managed to provide an environment that has less prejudice. Even so, it shouldn’t be undermined that even the most tolerant societies today have struggled to overcome prejudices. Without a doubt, there are multicultural societies that have failed to reach a tolerant position towards gender, race or religion issues.

To begin with, Turkey is considered to be a multicultural nation throughout its existence by origin. In other words, Turkish territory, long before Turkish Republic was founded, provided shelter for various ethnic populations and did not become multicultural as a pure society by becoming subject to the migrations from other nations. Indeed, the foundation of the new nation included many different ethnicities that have been present on the Turkish soil for a long time. Unfortunately, the inclusion of different ethnicities within the newly founded nation didn’t mean much to groups that were bound by their “pure” identities. Attacks towards “the different” have been a visible case since the foundation of Turkey and the case still is valid through different examples. The attacks towards people who are perceived as different are not only related to these people’s ethnic origin but also on their physical appearances or their sexual preferences.

The situation where people are undermined or even put under pressure because of their physical appearances and their sexual preferences is quite dramatically revealed in one particular Turkish movie, “Dönersen Islık Çal” by the director Orhan Oğuz. Two main characters of the movie, one a dwarf (Mevlüt Demiryay) and the other a transvestite (Fikret Kuşkan), are outcasts from the society they try so hard to live and fit in. These two “different” individuals come across one another by a twist of fate, where the blown whistle that the dwarf carries around to protect himself saves the transvestite that’s attacked by three thugs. Though, this isn’t one of the most joyful meetings between two people, their friendship that evolves throughout the movie is an interesting and sincere one. The sincerity of their friendship most certainly is an outcome of the fact that ordinary people, who perceive them as creatures, push them aside from the natural flow of life. They understand one another because of the fact that their living conditions are similar. They both live at night, when they believe the darkness covers their physical “flaws”. This friendship goes through rough patches while the two characters try to make a living for themselves and are forced to be tough against the situations they come across. It only ends with the tragic death of the dwarf who was beaten up by muggers against all the hard efforts of his friend to keep him alive. The last scene is perhaps the most memorable scene of the movie when the transvestite finds a room full of plastic balls stocked by the dwarf to become taller by playing with them. The transvestite throws the balls from the top of the building and suddenly everyone drops whatever they’re doing and begins to play with the balls without paying any attention to the people around them.

The film has managed to say various things about the identity issues within the Turkish context and in general. First of all, it points out that every individual feels a certain need of belongingness. This necessity both makes some people feel accepted and some feel rejected by the majority. This selfish need of a person can cause the rejected individuals to feel alone and cause them to become damaged throughout their lives. In order to recover from their damages, these individuals struggle to be accepted and to become “normal” either by playing with plastic balls late at night for hours to get taller or by going out at night when it’s dark. Others are forced to become what is normal. For instance, the transvestite is “normalized” by forcedly cutting her hair. On the outside she has to look like a man because of her genital organ and her hair has to be short “like a man”. She on the other hand, feels like a woman and is desperate to adapt the way she feels with her look. Second, the film reveals how some individuals take advantage of rejected people’s need for acceptance. There’s a vicious circle created through the existence of outcasts and insiders. The film is quite successful in terms of reflecting to the audience how awful it is to be on the outside and be different when the conditions are not tolerant towards them. Put into larger scale, the movie reveals how hard it is for diverse cultures resulting from diverse identities when they are pressured to be integrated within a strictly purified nation.

Thus, in light of this above-mentioned information, it’s not challenging to decide from which perspective the director of the movie Dönersen Islık Çal approaches the identity in that time’s living conditions in Turkey. The director, Orhan Oğuz reveals the point of view of the individuals who are oppressed by the intolerance of society in a dramatic manner. A proof of this claim is present in the film by the fact that the dwarf is removed from this intolerant environment by death after understanding that he will never be accepted as he is as a normal individual in the society. The only dramatic element of the movie is not the tragic death of the dwarf but also, the whole interactions of these two characters are extreme. Through the course of the film, they constantly get abused, beaten up, scolded, frustrated and sexually harassed. These disturbing manners of interaction is evident even in their interaction to one another; because they interact with other people in a certain disturbing way, the two characters approach one another by insulting and in some instances by physical violence.

In her article “Cultural Identity Analysis After 1980 on Contemporary Turkish Art”, the author Elif Akbulak suggests that in periods where artistic expressions, techniques and creativity all coincide together and are executed in a collaborative manner, are the periods in a country’s history that efficiently reflect the realities, social and cultural values of that period (pg. 10). In this context, in order for artistic expressions to reveal the circumstances of their time, the execution of these expressions should include various techniques and creativity alongside with a strong sense of observation. It would be safe to claim that after the 1980s different types of changes in Turkey both in sociological and economic life were effective in new declinations in art and culture, establishment of a relatively more liberated environment and exhibition opportunities. This has translated more contemporary works to be viewed by the public than the more traditional works that the public was accustomed to (pg. 24). This claim strongly suggests that with the changes in socio-economic structure in the 80s in Turkey, the film industry has transformed from a traditional approach of the social pattern towards a contemporary approach that tried to show all aspects of the contemporary conditions. The existing conditions of the 1980s in Turkey must then be analyzed to understand how these actualities were shown through the film industry. Therefore, the social structure has to be objectively observed to understand what has changed between pre-80s and after the 1980s in Turkish context. Akbudak points out these changes as, “Especially after 1980, when adopted policies are viewed, the social structure has changed in terms of individual tendencies gliding towards individualism. As a consequence, concepts that were present for centuries such as, communitarian phenomena and national values were replaced with individual expectations and relationships based on self-interest that were reflected in daily life.” (pg. 56) In the film Dönersen Islık Çal directed by Orhan Oğuz, we can see this transition from communitarian structure to individualistic structure, where self-interests of individuals are more dominant than social solidarity. The main factor behind this transition is “With globalization, individuals have found themselves at cross-roads. As a result, not to loose their identities, attitudes converging conservatism were evident.”(pg. 40) The family of the transvestite and others also present these conservative convergences in Orhan Oğuz’s film especially, in the scenes revealing the social pressure towards the transvestite. Akbudak in her article emphasizes that the works of artists who are detached from their time, indifferent and are closed to issues and developments would also be superficial (pg. 46). From this claim, the fact that Orhan Oğuz includes in his film Dönersen Islık Çal the time he lives in, which is 1980’s Turkey, and one of the most important issues of his era is a proof of the work not being superficial and universal.

Furthermore, with the change in social context of Turkey in the 1980s, the emergence of cultural stratifications is visible. These cultural classes were mainly referred to as high culture and low culture. The conceptualization of these terms after the 80s is a result of globalization and economic transitions such as, shift to liberal economy. High and low culture terms are found both in the society itself and in art circles. Going back to the superficiality debate about the artists and their works, there existed two types of artists; one, who was interested in social productions and the other, focusing on the profit aimed production. From these opposite definitions, Orhan Oğuz as a director can be classified as a director, who is more interested in social production. This suggestion is also proved by the fact that his film is still hard to be found in stores, it was not aired in popular theaters and can hardly be found in the Internet. To understand whether the fact that Dönersen Islık Çal is the only example among his films that didn’t bring him profit or not, his other films and their subjects should be observed. He has directed twenty-nine movies so far and the majority of these movies can be classified as “social productions”. Of course, due to the fact that he has chosen to make a career and a living out of making and directing movies, he has to earn money from this profession. Indeed, there are a couple of films such as, Manisa Tarzanı, Şaban Askerde and Süper Baba, which were relatively more of profit-aimed productions.

To conclude with, the film Dönersen Islık Çal is a unique film produced in 1992 that deals with the identity, social inclusion, individualism and intolerance issues in the 1980s in Turkey in a dramatic manner. The director of the film Orhan Oğuz has successfully managed to transmit the isolation and pressure that these characters in the movie and such people in the society feel to the audience. The actors and actresses that have participated in the making of the film have also done well in terms of transmitting these hard life conditions such as the main actors Mevlüt Demiryay as the dwarf and Fikret Kuşkan as the transvestite alongside with famous actor Menderes Samancılar and actress Derya Alabora. Though the film has created controversy and received harsh critiques from the public, the semi-objective telling of the story is worthy of appraisal. The fact that the film has received such criticisms reveals that there is still much to be done both through art and through cultural policies in Turkey to overcome the prejudices towards the diverse cultures and individuals in Turkey and as in many other parts of the world. It shouldn’t be forgotten that controversial films and works of art are driven from the realities of a country. These controversies can only be eliminated through formation of social cohesion and intercultural relations. Otherwise, harsh realities as long as they exist will receive criticisms when they are translated into works of art.