CLIMATES
She stands... silently looking at her partner. It's hot and there's a hint of annoyance on her face. He seems not to notice her as he takes photographs of some Hellenistic ruins. Finally she approaches, gently brushing against him, making her presence known. He asks if she's bored, she lies and then leaves him again to sit on a hill opposite of the ruins. She looks on some more and then starts crying.It takes a good couple of minutes (or so it seemed) for a tear to appear and then ever so slowly to glide down Ebru Ceylan's ravishing cheek. Edit that Harvey Weinstein!
It's a tell-tell opening scene of a film that has become somewhat a cause celebré among online film enthusiasts. Battle lines have been drawn and positions have been established, either embracing or attacking Nuri Bigle Ceylan's new film for its meditative stylistics and its relentless ambiguity. So what's all the fuss about?
A softly spoken architecture professor (Bigle Ceylan) is vacationing with his partner, the much younger art-director Bahar (Ebru Ceylan) in Turkey's South West. Their relationship is on the rocks, presumably because the professor can't keep his fly zipped. They separate after a particularly violent quarrel and Bahar disappears from the picture while the professor takes up with his fiery ex with whom he obviously enjoys a much more... lets just say interesting, sex life. His peace is however disturbed when he finds out that Bahar has left Istanbul, possibly with another man, to go on a long location film shoot in Turkey's East. Soon, he's off printing photos of their summer vacation and picking up romantic trinkets in the hope of enticing Bahar back.
That's about it really. Yes, its minimalist, its simple, there's hardly any exposition... whatever. I won't indulge in facile arguments about boringness, slowness or any other base reactions. We should always approach the filmmaker on his own terms, without demanding that he dress down to suit what we want. In fact, the film is actually compulsively watchable. You're carried along from one scene to the next, just because you don't know where it's going to go. It's a significant advantage that is achieved by keeping the characters shrouded in heavy fog: "Heavy ambiguity ahead! Turn on your brain searchlights please!"
So, herein lies the charge: Is Nuri Ceylan masking a rather embarrassingly simplistic tale of love turning sour with a heavy coat of bullet-proof pretentiousness or is he really making a profound statement about alienation and the emotional malaise of the modern man?
Herein lies the evidence: take a female character, put her in a shopping centre and have her sobbing in front of a shelf full of detergent. In one version she's shouting to a woman standing next to her that her husband's been cheating on her. In the other version, she's just standing there, looking at the detergent bottles and silently sobbing and sobbing while people pass her by. Version one is what you're likely to see in a 'Neighbours' episode and it'd take a really great director and actress to make the scene anything but trashy. Version two could be a scene from Nuri Ceylan film. And lets face it, we're going to be much more intrigued with version two, simply because we don't know what is making the woman cry. If it sounds suspiciously easy... well, I'm afraid it is. A clever director always makes good use of the unknown quantity and mystery - David Lynch has built his whole career concocting impregnable puzzles. Yet, as always, it's a question of degrees. Compare what Lynch does with a similarly cliched 'relationship in crisis' story in 'Lost Highway' to Nuri Ceylan's film and you'll know what I mean. It's like exploring a new galaxy as opposed to a small Caribbean island. Ceylan has neither the astounding imaginative power of Lynch, nor the philosophical depth of Antonioni to transform his film into a path-breaker. Which does not mean it's not successful on its own, smaller scale. Granted, the film feels like the bastard child of Rossellini's 'Voyage to Italy' and Antonioni's 'La Notte' and it shows in every sprocket of its celluloid DNA, but it's not a mere clone (read: simulacra). I do think that 'Climates' takes up the very same thematic concerns of these earlier films, but travels much further in its deconstruction of a romantic relationship. In a way, Ceylan has made a transgressive film, but made it so covertly, most people seem not to notice. Those who love it are enticed by its romanticism, tending to read it as a quiet emotional roller coaster. Those who hate it, blame it for the same reasons - it's short in its reach and doesn't do much more than whine about banalities.
To me, the transgression lies in the fact that this is an anti-romantic romantic movie. The central relationship is constructed around something that the characters perceive of as LOVE - a notion that Ceylan progressively begins to dismantle. When Bahar instigates a near-fatal accident this act is immediately read as a passionate gesture on her behalf, proclaiming her love and frustration towards Isa. But looking closely, it's a rather pathetic imitation of amour fou, its impact weak and embarrassing. Bahar is playing a role she thinks she must fulfil because the scenario calls for it, like an impressionable child acting out a scene from a Hollywood movie since she has no better way to respond. Similarly, her constant sobbing is usually interpreted as a genuinely earnest statement by the filmmaker - an indictment of Isa's actions. The crying is an important detail since not only does it become a kind of emotional apex in the film, but also causes much irritation or admiration in the audience. But it is meant to be irritating! Bahar's tears hint at the theatricality inherent in this relationship. She's unable (or unwilling) to comprehend that their problem is not because Isa has an occasional fuck outside of their non-matrimonial unit, the problem is that they're absolutely uninterested in who the other person is. Isa wants Bahar only because she looks good on him. His narcissism is implicit in the way Ceylan acts out the character, rendering him almost infuriatingly passive; his blankness is not a result of stupidity but dismissiveness. He doesn't care what his partner thinks (never mind about feelings) and once he's "used" Bahar, he discards her through a persuasive double-speak by arguing that she can find a more appropriate partner because she's still "young and attractive". His coldness and detachment are only underlined by the fact that they're in an idyllic setting - a context that is rife for romantic regeneration. But Bahar is masochistic, which is mainly self-induced and Isa simply hates people. She has a dream during which Isa mistreats her and the rest of time milks his infidelity for all the self-pity she can get. He, on the other hand, can only sustain interest by reducing his partners to objects of possession, his ex-girlfriend, Serap, for example. Once he sees her in a bookshop with a friend, his interest is suddenly piqued. Serap knows Isa all too well and her long, knowing laugh reduces Isa to a stale nut - something which he later forces her to eat in the ambiguously staged, highly borderline sex scene.
This subversiveness is the most fascinating aspect of the film. Here we have two very unlikable characters, rather fearlessly portrayed by the director and his real-life wife, playing a charade which they wish to will into reality by sheer play-acting. Maybe Ceylan's film would've been more successful if he was more upfront about his intentions. But I like the deceiving nature of this film. By conning the audience into 'buying' this cheap melodrama, Ceylan seems to be saying that we're all involved in "playing the game". And it's a cruel one but as it transpires in the end, the characters (and maybe the audience too) are only too happy playing it.
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