Sibel

SIBEL             B                    

Turkey  France  Germany  Luxembourg  (95 mi)  2018  ‘Scope  d:  Çağla Zencirci and Guillaume Giovnetti

A kind of mythical film from the tiny village of Kuşköy in northeastern Turkey, nestled in the Pontic Mountains along the Black Sea coast, a region where its 500 or so residents are known for harvesting tea leaves and hazelnuts, but also for their distinctive whistling sounds which are used to communicate long distances, one of the few places on earth to practice this technique, yet it’s a common local practice that’s been in existence for at least 400 years.  The rugged mountainous landscape and sparse population make travel difficult even over short distances, where a whistle can reverberate for more than a kilometer.  The co-directing and writing team found this unique cultural facet so inspiring that they decided to make a film there, set in the forests, using mostly nonprofessionals from the region, but also 5 professional actors who had to get up at dawn, eat something and catch a bus to the locale, then hike 2000 meters up a mountain daily just to arrive in the right location.  The film revolves around Sibel, Damla Sönmez, a Turkish actress who has studied acting in Istanbul, Paris and London, whose performance couldn’t be more physically challenging, a mute who lost her voice at an early age, but is easily understood through whistling, and who roams the forest like a feral child, where nothing escapes her watchful eye.  She is the daughter of Emin (Emin Gürsoy), the patriarchal head of the village, with a kind of spoiled younger sister Fatma, Elit Işcan, who also played one of the older sisters in Deniz Gamze Ergüven’s Mustang (2015), who basically despises how Sibel gets away with everything.  For instance, she’s the only woman in the entire region who doesn’t wear a head scarf, but she spends much of her time in the forest isolated and alone, ostracized by the other women of the village who believe she’s been cursed, so don’t want to be anywhere near her, openly rejecting her when she comes too close.  She operates by an entirely different set of rules, fiercely adapting herself to male skills, as she’s one of the more adept hunters of the region, the envy of her father (as she’s certainly a better shot), but also works in the fields picking tea leaves with the other women, while cooking her family dinner every night and also washing the clothes.  If the thought of Cinderella comes to mind, she seems to do the backbreaking work while her younger sister needs to study.  They have an antagonistic relationship because Fatma is embarrassed by her lack of civility, as she has no manners, dresses like a boy, and most importantly, cannot speak.      

Partly to protect the women in the village, the local culture devised a myth about a wolf that roams in the higher regions of the mountains, which keeps everyone closer to their village.  Sibel, however, insists on hunting the wolf, hoping to win approval, believing the town will welcome and embrace her if she can kill the prized animal, so she spends her time roaming through the forests, viewed as a primitive spirit that belongs more to the land than the community.  While this is an extreme patriarchal society where men set the rules, it’s the women that carry them out, expelling anyone that’s different.  What’s particularly striking is the extent that Sibel repulses everyone, even her own sister, forcing her to live the life of an exile.  Perhaps mirroring her situation is Narin (Meral Çetinkaya), an eccentric old woman who lives alone, having lost her grasp of reality a long time ago, believing in ancient stories and myths as if they were real, still waiting for her fiancé who disappeared ages ago.  Sibel appears to be the only one willing to befriend Narin, seen regularly chopping wood, bringing her food, and just generally looking after her, even as both are shunned by the rest.  Sibel appears to be living in the mythical universe that Narin describes, yet the realist manner in which the movie is filmed, following every detail of Sibel’s daily existence, suggests a different consciousness, one that is aware of her exclusion and the stigma she’s forced to live with, yet has a yearning to be liked and appreciated.  During a hunt for the wolf, Sibel is ferociously attacked by a man hiding in the thicket, whose mysterious presence presents its challenges.  While rather easily fending him off, she discovers he’s deeply wounded and secretly nurses him back to health, offering food and protection while hiding him in the forest.  Even as police officials are combing the neighborhoods for dangerous men who are presumed to be terrorists at large, Sibel keeps her secret, who turns out to be Ali (Erkan Kolçak Köstendil), another outcast we learn little about, as Sibel can’t really communicate with him.  Like Narin, she regularly looks in on him, helps him regain his strength, and even offers help stitching up his wound.  As she collects what she believes are wolf bones found scattered throughout the brush, wondering whether to announce the wolf may finally be dead, Ali helps dispel her notions, knowing human remains when he sees them, quickly setting her straight. 

In a male-dominated society, a woman’s role is to marry and have children, preferably a son, words we hear preached throughout this film, as part of the village tradition is the use of matchmakers for arranged marriages, where young girls are chosen at early ages, an ancient practice that is viewed as an honor to each family, with gifts bestowed upon the young bride and groom, complete with celebratory festivities that include plenty of food and dancing.  While Sibel is routinely ignored, treated as subhuman, Fatma is handpicked and is obviously excited at the prospect, as is her father, surprisingly, who tells Sibel he was growing tired of Fatma’s spoiled outbursts anyway, and this allows the two of them to spend more time together.  Incredulously, Fatma throws her own sister out of the marriage celebration, a humiliating gesture that simply perpetuates an ingrained class divide, as Sibel is continually placed at the bottom rung, shunned by everyone except her father, which leaves her seething with anger and shame, having to contain all that boiling rage of resentment at how she’s continually despised, finding solace only in the isolation of the forest.  Yet it’s her demonstrative, open display of freedom that seems to threaten the women of the village, who find her such a nuisance for avoiding all social conventions.  Fatma turns the tables on her, telling her father Sibel was seen with a man in the forest, that she followed them herself as she couldn’t believe her own eyes.  When Sibel denies the accusations, Fatma calls her a liar, which gets her silenced by her father.  But in the fields the next day, Sibel is confronted by a collection of women who implement their own brand of punishment, beating her half to death to teach her a lesson.  As she frantically searches for Ali to warn him afterwards, he’s disappeared altogether and vanished into thin air, leaving no trace, almost like he was never there.  The police come investigating, asking to speak to Sibel, who offers heartbreaking testimony through whistles, insisting the man was unarmed and not a terrorist, as alleged, but her father protects her and leaves out essential information, denying she saw anyone, but knowing all along she was harboring a fugitive.  Word of Sibel’s betrayal is a jolt to the community, causing Fatma’s marriage to be called off, where she has to return the gifts, leaving her utterly exasperated by her sudden fall from grace, completely demoralized by the shame of it all, where she can’t face anyone ever again.  Sibel, of course, knows exactly how that feels, having been on that end of the stick her entire life, and encourages her sister to get dressed as together they make that long walk in front of the entire town, all stopping what they’re doing and staring in disbelief, like a walk of shame, with hateful insults hurled at them both, but for Sibel it’s utter defiance, staring them all straight in the eye, as at the end of town a bus awaits Fatma, exactly as it was in Mustang, with Sibel making sure her sister’s head is held high, taking her off to school where hopefully a different future awaits. 

Non-Fiction (Doubles Vies)

Director Olivier Assayas with actress Juliette Binoche

NON-FICTION (Doubles Vies)            C+               

aka:  Double Lives

France  (108 mi)  2018  d:  Olivier Assayas

Arguably the director’s weakest film, a bungling attempt to offer something important to say about the changing digital landscape, yet for all its chattiness and endless conversations about the publishing business, it becomes clumsy and wretchedly monotonous, playing a viciously circular game questioning the future of books, newspapers, and even the existence of libraries themselves, all supposedly replaced by digital content that will render the printed page meaningless.  Disappointed, to say the least, as Assayas is one of the more inventive modern directors, yet this has surprisingly little to say, instead falling into a typical bourgeois world of comfort and complacency.  Despite a first rate cast, Assayas’s written script leaves something to be desired, as it all amounts to pure speculation, though it’s treated like a done deal, filled with facts and figures for arguments in support, including the latest trends, which comes across like something out of a business investment magazine, where it’s preached like the gospel, only to later discover that the rush to judgment was a bit premature, rendering all the previous arguments as utter rubbish, yet that’s what constitutes the core of the movie.  Told in a freewheeling style, like a screwball comedy, the brisk pace of the film is quick and concise, with little room for hesitation, almost exclusively taking place in the tightly compressed spaces of offices, hotel rooms, bars and café’s, and the enclosed intimacy of home.  Exposing what duplicitous lives we lead, having a secret lover on the side while engaged in long-term relationships, where the divide is lack of trust, which mirrors the newspaper or print media, which has never been more guilty at telling targeted audiences exactly what they want to hear, whether it’s true or not, ignoring journalistic integrity and even standards of decency, developing a callous and indifferent attitude about destroying lives in the process by spreading rumors or gossip, especially when based on bad information, but what matters is whether or not they have a readership or viewing audience.  While the prevailing argument is that people read less today, the counter argument is that this is blatantly untrue, only the source is different, as they’re not reading as many novels or newspapers, but they’re reading texts, websites, and blog information instead, picking and choosing their sources.  While this opens up the floodgates on a discussion about the digital world, it barely touches the surface, offering trends and superficial points of view that may or may not have meaning, as it’s still too early to tell, and instead feels like a group of like-minded, white, over-privileged bourgeois individuals tossing their own opinions around, ignoring large segments of the globe who think differently than they do, whose ideas are completely ignored because it doesn’t fit the business model.  So what this really tells us in an interglobal world is that we’re only really interested in ourselves, rarely venturing out of our comfort zones.

Even the English title is misleading, as non-fiction suggests truth, not fiction, yet there’s very little underlying truth about this film, instead it’s swarming with the latest rumors and gossip, filled with self-centered people who couldn’t care less about what’s happening in the world, so long as they can lead comfortable lives.  The French title is more accurate, suggesting truth is ever more elusive, holding double meanings, which means different things to different audiences, which makes it that much harder to reach any common understanding.  At the center of the picture is a bourgeois, middle class couple, like the ones depicted in Haneke’s Caché (Hidden) (2005), where Alain (Guillaume Canet) is an erudite book publisher with a fashionable actress wife Selena (Juliette Binoche), and while they have a young son he barely makes his presence felt, like he’s an afterthought, certainly not the center of their world.  Their lives conveniently revolve around themselves, including a massive home, an upscale Audi car, and all creature comforts, where they’re used to eating in the nicest restaurants.  While Selena makes tons of money playing a cop on TV (for the fourth season), she’s quick to point out she’s not a cop, but a crisis management expert.  In the scenes we see, however, the focus of attention is on guns blasting, going full-on assault mode, where there’s little effort spent managing any crisis, as they are too busy inflicting one instead.  Early on Alain has a business meeting and lunch with one of his longtime authors, Leonard (Vincent Macaigne), but refuses to publish his new work, which feels more like his sleazy sexual exploits surrounded by more autobiographical self-aggrandizement.  Just so you can understand the eloquent and flowery manner of speech Alain uses throughout the conversation, remaining tactful and inoffensive, Leonard never gets the picture his work is being turned down, which comes as quite a surprise at the end, especially after all the so-called complimentary talk.  The two are like polar opposites, with Alain immaculately dressed, his words carefully chosen, his home a picture of tasteful décor, while Leonard stumbles and stammers, never really getting his thoughts out, and dresses shabbily, where his apartment is a mess, as nothing is apparently ever put away.  His live-in girlfriend Valerie (Nora Hamzawi), on the other hand, is more like Alain, concise in her expression, saying exactly what she means, and is the real breadwinner in the family, working as a high profile attorney while supporting a socially conscious Socialist political candidate who is having trouble getting his message across, as it can’t be explained in the television sound bites and twitter universe.  Valerie’s matter-of-fact way of handling things is the complete opposite of Leonard, making it clear she couldn’t care less about his publishing troubles, while Leonard’s prone to think he’s the center of the known universe. 

While these four characters represent the focus of the film, as the film progresses we witness how cavalierly they cheat on one another.  Alain has hired a first rate head of digital operations who seems fresh out of university, always providing definitive answers about the death of the book publishing industry, having been raised in an era that immersed themselves in technology and the Internet, she finds it so much simpler and more advantageous than the “old ways,” and e-books are so much cheaper and can be transported anywhere.  Not only does Alain give her free rein at the company, he’s having an affair with this much younger girl as well, which feels a bit humorous, as she loves the sex but has utter contempt for what he does for a living.  Perhaps more surprising, Selena has been carrying on an affair with Leonard for years, and is his biggest booster, but is highly slighted when he publishes personal elements of their relationship, using it for material in his books, which she instantly recognizes and then has to cover her tracks afterwards, suggesting that’s someone else.  This fictionalized line is expressed to her husband, serving as a misdirection, though it becomes a central piece of her marriage, where preserving secrets and lies is essential.  Valerie has similar problems with her political candidate’s sexual misadventures which must be kept from the press, preserving his image at all costs, where lying is an essential ingredient.  While they all have positive attributes, they spend their lives covering up a darker underside, where they are never quite what they seem, but are instead understood by how they appear to be, where much of what they project is all an act.  Marriages fall apart from bad acting, apparently, as people don’t sell their lies as well.  While they all retreat to friendly groups and are connected to larger social circles that endlessly discuss the topics of the day, where Valerie finds it unnerving that even her closest associates find it difficult to support her candidate, or Selena gets embarrassed at the thought of selling out for commercial gain, finding little or no value in her television series, as it’s not the least bit challenging, but she gets a gargantuan salary that supports her lavish lifestyle.  The way things play out does challenge our growing dependence on technology, confronting radical changes in our changing world, where various points of view are aired, but it’s hard to find anything new or revelatory about this film, just as it’s hard to place meaning or value on the rapidly changing Internet culture, which is always in a state of flux, instead it just rehashes all the various opinions we’ve already heard before, mostly just skimming the surface.  Cinematically this lacks verve and imagination, especially compared to Demonlover (2002), for instance, one of the first films to examine the effects of the digital age.  While we have never heard Assayas flail away and be so repetitious in his films before, endlessly belaboring ideas that amount to little more than cliché’s, with characters that couldn’t be less appealing, so myopic in their own lives, sending signals of utter complacency by the end, hardly a message that needs airing, where of all the Assayas films seen, this one has the least to offer.

Note

The film inaccurately attributes a quote from Giuseppe di Lampedusa’s historic novel The Leopard, published posthumously in 1958, “If we want things to stay as they are, things will have to change,” suggesting it was uttered near the end by Don Fabrizio, the Prince of Salina, a character who was deeply resistant to change, but in fact it was spoken much earlier by his nephew Tancredi Falconieri, the voice of a new generation, remarking upon the continuance of Sicilian aristocratic life.  One wonders if this was done intentionally, as Assayas is extremely well-read, suggesting that in today’s world, as suggested by Kiarostami’s CERTIFIED COPY (2010), fake truth is just as easily accepted as the actual truth.