Miasto, które wyjechało / The Town That Drove Away

PL 2025, 70 mins, ori­gi­nal ver­si­on with German and English sub­tit­les, Dir/Screenplay/Cinematography: Natalia Pietsch, Grzegorz Piekarski / Editors: Alan Zejer, Michał Buczek / Music: Jozef van Wissem, Ali Ayhan

The anci­ent town of Hasankeyf on the Tigris, set amidst the rug­ged moun­tai­nous land­scape of Northern Kurdistan, is home to an old fort­ress. Its caves, too, are of gre­at cul­tu­ral and his­to­ri­cal value. Yet time and again, loud explo­si­ons shake the town – not from gun­fi­re, but from blas­ting. The Turkish govern­ment has deci­ded to build a huge dam that will gra­du­al­ly flood the town.
Life is gra­du­al­ly fading away; bit by bit, the buil­dings are being demo­lished and the resi­dents evacua­ted. A few kilo­me­t­res away, a brand-new town awaits them – meti­cu­lous­ly plan­ned and effi­ci­ent, but devo­id of histo­ry and soul. This is whe­re Burak, a hair­dress­er, and his deaf father, along with the young Rengin, who dreams of stu­dy­ing far away, are also due to move. They are among the last to remain in Hasankeyf, whilst next door the excava­tors are dis­mant­ling the his­to­ric buil­dings. The direc­tors do not pre­sent a poli­ti­cal pam­phlet on the deli­be­ra­te des­truc­tion of natu­re and cul­tu­re, but rather a sen­si­ti­ve por­trait of peo­p­le who­se fami­li­ar sur­roun­dings are sim­ply dis­ap­pearing. Using a sta­tic came­ra and subt­ly employ­ed music, they casual­ly gather small details which, taken tog­e­ther, tell a grand sto­ry. [Rainer Mende]

11 September / 8.00 pm / fsk Kino / Guests: Natalia Pietsch & Grzegorz Piekarski
[Tickets]