bu gece ustume leylak cicekleri giydim......

bu gece ustume leylak cicekleri giydim......
tenimdeki kokusunu aratmayan,
sonra anglo-saxon bir uyanis
yabanci adamin tetikledigi,
kacamadim,
teslim oldum oracikta,
yildizlar kadar acik ve netti,
dudaklarimda sappho acti, tomurcuklarla....
pembe bir bulut gibi bedenimde,

sonra senin ellerin vardi
yuregimde

sonra o gozden kayboldu
ben kaldim basbasa seninle.....

I/MMXI   london &ducdesmyrne

my baby shot me down, bang, bang

bu basligi atali uzun yillar gecti,
altini doldurmakta zorlandim,
belki gercekligi agir basiyordu,
gereksiz buldum bu basligin altina birseyler yazmayi,
pekte bir anlam ifade etmemisti,
bosa karalamanin yakisiksiz alacagini  dusundum,
sonra hakikat geldi
oturdu,
sahile yaslanmis gecmisime,
acmayi bekleyen tomurcuklarin ustune,
basim fena halde derteydi kendimle
o gunlerde,

basimi yaslarken eski bir turbenin ayakucuna ,
kargalar sesizce gectiler,
badem agaclari henuz acmamisti,
iste boyle birseydi,
uzulmek ustesinden gelmeme yardimci olmuyordu,
bir ceset gordum sahilde,
gozlerinden okunuyordu...........

aslinda my baby shot me down ......

MMXLONDON& CERITH

bir sair tanidim, II.Episode

Yarim kalan seyler vardi,

Ilk yazdan arta kalan,
beni rahatsiz eden….
bir ozlem Cihangir camisi avlusunda birakilmis,
bir defne Mont Pagus eteklerinde,

ayaklarim ne zaman beni o noktaya suruklese,
icinden iceri
icten ice
ceken bir bulut
nar misali .....

yine ayaklarim,

eski bir sairin yoluna dustu,
o kendini kadin sair olarak tanimlarken,
ben kizardim ona,
Isa, Rimbaud ve O
oturmuslar bir ucgenin ortasinda,


kimi an sahte bir sarisin,
kimi zamansa icinden kizil bir kadin gecerdi,
garip telefon konusmalarinin sonunu kestirmek zordu,
yakisiksiz kacabilecegini bilmeyen bir cocuk vardi icinde,
ama kimini olume surukleyen,
bu aslinda durumunun hicte iyi olmadiginin gostergesiydi,

bilmem ki kurban kimdi,
kendisi mi?
kentin ibneleri mi?
ghettolarindan gelen serseriler mi?
yoksa tum bunlarin tanigi
Maria miydi?


bunlari bolen bir fransizca ezgiydi,
sonra yine Rimbaud gecti yanimizdan,
saklanmisti sessizce
tanidi bizi gulumsedi....


humanizmami yitiriyordum kimi anlar,
kentin yorgunlugu cokmustu ustumuze,
huzursuz ruhlarin komun sevdasi,
onu elestirmek yanlisligina dusuyordu insan,
ama o gece Maria sokakta kaldi,
ben sahittim tum olan bitene....
polisler bir kacak ariyordu,
kalbi Findikli sahilinde denize vurmustu,
bir cay icti sessizce,
gozlerindeki endise Pasalimani sahilinden okunuyordu,
benim bile teselli etmemin mumkunati gozukmuyordu,

yine lacivert uniformali polisler gectiler,
lacivert biyiklarini burarak,
bakislarindaki korkunun kokusu benim bile basimi donduruyordu,
tansiyon Fidikli sahilini kusatti,
kusettli vagonla kacirmaliydim Maria'yi,
uyurken gececekti hersey,
yanibasimizdaki endise sarmisti etrafi,
Istanbul kadar yalnizdi......

ne olurdu, kizina ne yaparlardi,
kocasi geldi gozlerinin onune ,
gozyaslarini tutamadi,
ne cok seyi paylasmislardi birlikte,
ustune koyamadigi anilari
acisindan da agirdi,
o ara arkadasi olan emekli polis muduru,
Irfan geldi aklina,
onun yasam hikayesini dinlemisti,
korku icinde yetismis cocuklari vardi,
Lenin komunistti,
Gorki okumamisti,
Piano hic dinlememisti,


ama o mutlu ve basariliydi,
cocuklarida keza,
peki ya Maria?
Gagavuz Turku,
Hristiyan Maria?
Dinyeper nehrinde yikanmis Maria Neden diye sordu?

aklinda butun bu sorular,
yanitsiz,
Findikli sahilinde,
bir basina
caresiz basina gelecekleri beklemekten baska
bir sey yoktu.....
beni kahredense elllerimin yetisemesiydi,
onun huznunun yeldegirmenlerine.....

c.cerit / ottobre mmxi, findikli, istanbul

الوردة الدمشقية‎ Rose of Castile &Hamilton Bulvari’nda Bir Ben

Hamilton Bulvarinda ne arar adam,
gece sisli lacivert mavilere burunmusken,
buz gibi sogukta,
Askim elimi tutmazkan,
nefes cekislerimiz birbirine karisirken,
St.Markt Kilisenin bahcesinde,
sogukta ay yerdegistiriken,
boslukta sigara kulleri ucusurken,
Neden tartisiyorduk ki biz,
Neden geceleri beni sokaklarda yuruturdun,
yurudugumuz kilometreler degilde,
Seni sevmek yoruyordu beni,
herkose basinda yeni bir hikaye anlatirdim ben sana,
hic ortak olmadigin,
hic anlamadigin,
hic bitmesini istemedigim,
sen mi ben mi ?
neden birbirimizi degistirmeye calistigimiz,
gunlerin sonrasina gelen…..
hep o ani bekledim,
elimi tutacagin o ani,


sonra birgun bakkala diye cikmistim,
kendimi Sevilla’da sarhos bir kaldirimda buldum,
yanimda bir Ossa motosiklet,
basimin altinda bir El Pais
ve bos Coronita siseleri,
arkamda koca La Giralda,
La Koutoubia’ya oykunen
uzaklarda Guadalquivir’in kokusu,
ustunde Calatrava’nin izleri,
Elbotellón cigliklari yukseliyordu korunun diger yakasindan,
Triana'da adamlar geceye soyunurken,
Puente De Isabel II'yi sis bulutu sarmisken,
Piazza d’Espana’da cirilciplak kalmistim,
Ahh magrur, karsi kiyinin incisi Triana,
kimse bilmesede,
avazim ciktigi kadar seni seviyorum diye haykirirken,
kent ayaklarimin altindan oylece kayip giderken,


sen yoktun,
Sevilla portakal kokuyordu,
bense les,
yine bir gun,
ansizin Chelsea’de buldum kendimi,
Sakura donencesi,
Butoh sessizligi,
sizmisti aramiza,

oncesinde dogudaydim,
kendimi dinlemekti amacim,
ama senin Echolarin
pesimi,
yakami,
gecmisimi
birakmiyordu,
ne yapmistin sen bana,
unutmakta,
yitirmekte,
anlamakta,
gucluk cekmekteydim,
neden geceleri,
o sogukta,
o sokaklarda yururduk biz,

Sen Hamilton Bulvari boyunca,
soguk kis geceleri,
sokak tilkileri nobette iken,
karanlikta,
yalnizligimizda gorunmezdi,
Hamilton Bulvarinda,


ikimizde icimizden gecirirken
tum soylenmemis sozleri,
kimdi hicbirsey soylemeyen
dudaklarin mi?
kalbin mi ?
yoksa tutamadigim ellerin mi?


icinden gecen Istanbul portreleri,
yatmisti boylu boyunca hayallerimize,
birbirlerine teget gecen,
biri Pera’ya bakan bir pencere
digeri Tatavlaya acilan bir kapi,
biri Asiyan’da Tanpinar,
oteki Burgaz’da Sait Faik
biri Kuzguncuk’ta ak kuzgun
digeri Kartal’da kara bir Kartal,
biri Cemberlitas’ta bir dehliz,
digeri Kadirga’da bir su sarnici,
biri Karakoy’de deniz,
digeri Balat’ta bir sinagog…..
kimi zamansa yerdegistiriken farkli yonlerde,
yorungelerde,
ben aslinda
kucuk mavi yildizli bir etamin ceketin altinda usuyen bir cocuktum
senin bakipta goremedigin….


bak bir Damask Rose ucusuyor,
senin topraklara yakin bir vadiden,
yayiliyor rayiha,
tarihe,
an’a
gecmise,
ozleme,
beni zehirleyen askimiza,
Sparta’ya ulasirken kokular,
ben yorgun bir Truva kralinin verandasindan,
seyrediyor olacagim,
yanarken Buffovento kalesi,
sen elinde bir parsomen parcasiyla kosarken
sahildeki kalyona…..
simdi Dos Hermanas mi daha yakin yoksa Jaen'mi?


Pasha,
seni yazdim,
seni cizdim,
seni boldum,
seni carptim,
seni cikardim,
ama seni cikaramadim
seni atamadim,
icimden,
disimdan,
dudaklarimdan,
dusuncelerimden,
aklimdan,

Ahh Bre Pasam,
ben gunahlarimin bedelini odemistim Bre Pasam,
benim Annem yok bre Pasam,
bilmezmiydin hic Pasam……



…….unutmak ile ozlemek arasi bir yolda Adrianapolis’e yaklasirken, Sevilla’da café corto yudumlarken, Efes’te mandalina bahcelerinin icinde camura saplanirken, Chelsea’de aylak aylak yagmurdan islanirken, Karakoy’de liman’da gozlerimi dindirirken………………
                                                                           Adrianapolis&Sevilla&Efes&London&Istanbul MMX

HEIMATLOSS

canim herzamanki gibi….
Istanbul ayni ritimde…
boyasi akmis evler geciyor hayalet gecmisimizden,
yakin bir kiyida tanidik bir gramafon caliyor,
bizlerin makamlari ise,
o makamlara uymayan,

Maviye sevdali,
Gunbatarken,
Gece ve sen inmemisken sahile……..
Geciyordu gunler
eskimiste olsa,
eskitilmiste olsa,
beklentiler eskiye gore
iste o gunler cevremi saran
yalnizligimin secimleri var,


Than’in Saigon sokaklarinda
yasemin kokan yagmurlarinda
dinlenmis bir ruhu
kimi zaman cok yasanmis hallere burunen,
siz Than’i tanimasanizda
benden birseyler tasiyan
kucuk Vietnamli Parisien kiz
ona islak bir Istanbul aksami rastladim,
sahile yakin duruyordu,
Benjamin’e sirti donuk,
Bruce Weber portreleri sizmis aralara,
uzun sure konusmadilar,
nedenlerini siralamaksizin,
anin icinde gidip geldiler,
biliyorlardi ki ellerinde olan,
tek seyin tatminini….


ben yine kirgindim o gunlerde,
muzdarip kendimden,
bitkin hallerimden,
yorgun portremden,
icimde olmamis hayallerin,
sonradan giydirilmis halleri,

Paris kokan kucuk vietnamli kiz,
ve Alsace’li soluk benizli Ben
birgun ansizin,
cekip gittiler,
digerleri gibi,

bende kaldi
biraz kokulari,
biraz huzunleri
biraz sevismeleri,

icim icimi bururken
yaban otlari buyurken,
tatli eski bir tonda
Moda ile Bairo Alto arasi bir yerlerde,
birilerini burusturan
kimilerini bulusturan
gunlerin sonunda,
bazi aksamlarda tanidik yabancilar,
bu kente yabanciligimi dindiren,
bu kente yabaciligimi hiddetlendiren,
meragimi siddetlendiren
merhametimi kullendiren,
yeganeligimi kabullendiren…


Iste o gunlerden bir gun,
Hatice vardi kimi aksamlar
umitsizce evli Libyali bir adami beklerdi,
Italyan yokusuna yakin bir yerde,
hic anlamazdim insan Atlas daglarindan
kalkip Cihangir'de bir adami beklermiydi hic boyle,
Firuzaga’da tika basa dolu yalnizlar kahvesinde
avunmak degildi amaci,
ama yinede orada oturur beklerdi,
yaninda eski duskun kadinlari animasatan Canan,
sari boyasi akmis saclari,
elinde ucuncu sinif kuyumculardan alinmis pirlanta taslari,
diger yaninda kocasi tarafindan terkedilmis Suzan,
onun mavi gozleri,
aski memnu pesinde kosan bir dul,
gorumcesi guzel Hulya,
Hatice tum bu kakofoninin ortasinda,
digerleri dusler kurarken,
O kurmaz, Hisham’i beklerdi
gelmeyecegini bilerek,
kendine yetmeyen bir yani vardi…..
hep bi adim onde giderdi
onu cevreleyen rutubete bakmaksizin,


Istanbul tuhafti,
Marco Tatavla’da mekan tutmustu…
Efemera gunlerine inat,
Bologna’nin Vespertina’si cok uzakti,
Toscana’nin kirlari,
Siena’nin kuleleri
gunden gune
Tatavla meydaninda
Aziz Dimitrios kilisesine bakan meydandan,
dunyayi izlerdi,
dedim ya,
ne arardi, bilinmez…..




Luka Sakizagaci’nda
Galeriler arasi canbazlik yapardi,
Eskiden Airbus fabrikasina gizlice girmeye calistigi gunler geride kalmisti,
Franco’dan kacan ailelerinin cocuklariyla Tolouse’da yetiskinlige adim atarken
Annesi Italyanca konusurdu onunla,
Babasi isvicre aksaninda fransiz,
dedim ya
ne arardi bilinmez,


Mao Yildiz’da
Barbarossa’ya yakin biryerlerde,
Cinar agaclarinin golgesinde yasardi,
Sake icerdik,
ama asla Kabuki konusunu acmazdi,
henuz Sapporo’ya gitmemisti,
bilmem neden,
tuhaf bir kizdi,
iffetsiz islere meyilliydi,
dansoz olmak istiyordu ya,
hepimizi bir kahkaha basardi,
abuk sabuk adamlara takilirdi,
sonra zorla kacar kurtulurdu,
dogulular herzaman ki gibi Pera’nin arka sokaklarini paylasmislardi,
oda hicbirsey olmamis gbi o mekanlarda,
ruhunu beslemek isterdi bize garip kacan yerlerde,
sonra tuhaf film setlerinde boy gosteriyordu,
bir Bollywood fiminde bile kucuk bir rol kapmisti,
memnundu anlasilan,
ne arardi bilinmez ……
dedim ya,




Clement Tarlabasinda mekan tutmustu,
cekilmeyen bir Bretagne agzi vardi,
ustune Tarlabasina yakisan bir yani,
Uber-bohem ile cheap arasi gidip gelen,
Onurunu Paris’te yerle bir etmis bir hali vardi,
ciplak bir mekan anlayisinda
soyunurdu gune,
ama bana hayranligi, duskunlugu onu affettirirdi,
uzulurdum kimi zaman onun icin,
ama o buyumustu,
ne arardi bilinmez,
dedim ya,


Matthias Harbiye’de
bira kokan meyhanelerin tuzagina yakindi,
kac gun daha bekleyebirdi Dame de Sion cikisinda
hic bulamadigi aski beklemeye gucu var miydi
Fureya kucuktu,
Kalbi vardi, seker hastasiydi….
Macka’da universiteye yakin bir yerlerde otururdu,
Valide Sulatan Cesme’sinde bulusurlardi kimi zaman,


O ve Matt nasil olurdu bilinmez,
O oyle alismamisti Bayern’de bir koyde,
Gecmisinin unutturarak yetistirilmisti,
duzgunlugu huzursuzluk yaratirdi,
kusursuzlugu kirlilik,
aah dedim ya
ne arardi bilinmez,

sonra Eda vardi,
telasliydim o gunlerde,
nereye,
kendime,
nasil yetisecegimi
bilmemenin yaratttigi kaos,
Arda vardi,
Eda’nin kocasi,
guzel adam Fatih vardi,
Onun humanizmasi annemi animsatirdi,
durusu hayranlik uyandiran bir adam,

Egeliydi, tuhaf ama kekik sevmezdi
ama kekik kokardi,
Deniz kokardi,
bir kedisi vardi,
gitar calardi,
begonvillerin acmasini beklerdik birlikte,
ben arada hic gelmeyecegini bildigim mektuplar beklerdim,
Kibris’tan bir iki haber,


benim korkularim vardi,
sezerdi, ama uzakti,
kendini mesgul etmenin yollarini bilirdi,
huzur bulurdum onun yaninda,
sonra Spanish Tortilla yedigimiz gunlerimiz oldu,
yada Tom Sam salad,
onu rokali gunler,
dereotlu corekler,
patlicanli borekler,
garip yerlerde buldugumuz egzotik cicekler,
benim lavantalarin yaydigi kokular,
rakili uykusuz geceler,
takip etti…..

Eda’ya olan sevgimiz ayniydi,
icinden ince ince kristal kar taneleri gecen,
icinden Fioana Apple’in
“Why try to change me know” adli parcasi gecen,
belkide beni en iyi anlatan dizelerdi,
I go to the corner, I end up in the Spain ......



bahcede hic bitmesini arzulamadigimiz geceler yasardik,
sorunlar hic bitmezdi,
salyangozlar yeni diktigimiz herseyi yemisti,
biz onlari bir turlu yiyememistik ya,
kapici Pertev yine karisini dovmustu,
bakkal kopek gibi sarhostu,
bahcede dekor olarak duran silahlar vardi,
yan komsu hala tek kelime soylememisti,
Eda’nin sarhoslugu en guzel anlardi,


kimi zaman onlara bu kadar yakin olup,
bu kadar uzun sure onlari gormeden yasamayi
kendime yediremezdim,
anahtarim oldugu halde,
kendimi kitlerdim,
adim atamazdim,


Iste oyle
Istanbul’u severdim ben
yoksa Fatih’i
bilmem…….
tek bildigim hepsi benim ruhumdan birseyler tasirdi,
dokunamadigim,
incitmeye kiyamadigim…………….

c.cerit sonbahar Istanbul X-X 2011

Västerås'te Ay Tutulmasi

kim ne soylese,
kim ne eylese,
bir nefeste,
donenceler cekinirken,
icim cekilirken,
cekim ekseninin disina kayarken
kendiliklerimin,
otekilerinin de dislanmisligi var icimde,

oysa ben,
bir ay firtinasi,
ortasinda kala kaldim,

sen ustumuze orerken barikatlari
migferin bolerken geceyi,
orterken Hades’in karanliginda,
yay gibi cizilen altimizdaki Kohi baliklarini......
ben Rossio Istasyonunun kalabalik sesizligiyle orulup,
seni ortuyorum seninle……
oruyorum herseyi bir orumcek ignesiyle,
salvalar ipeksi bir dokunusa donusmeden,
oturmazken hicbirsey yerliyerine,
Pangaltida buluyorlar beni,
garip bir aksanda,
cirilciplak,
bir sedir agacinin altinda,
aklim karisiyor,
gidip geliyor an ve mekan,
Tuten Sisli Etfal’de yatiyor,
Ceyla Cenevra’de,
Alexandre New York’ta
bilmedigim bir café’de gazetesini okuyor,
Dilaila suan siniri geciyor,
Isvicre’li polis memuruna herzamanki gibi gulumsuyor,
birazdan Moltrasio’da olacak,
Como’da yagmur henuz dinmis....


ote yanimda Bergman hayaletleri,
Sah Mat oyununda
kirik bir kale,
kimse bilmiyor
ne olasilikta
ne olabilirlikte,
tas adim atmiyor,
adim atman tas kesiliyor,
sanki Västerås’te bir cocuk
hayal meyal hatiramda,
hayal metal hatiratinda
belki de babamin hatiratinin hayaleti,
genlerinden gecen,
bir o kadar tanidik,
bir o kadar taniklik,
bir o kadar karisik,


iste oyle bir an,
yakalarken beni,
Trellick Tower’in hayaleti girmis icime,
hic cikmiyor Golborn Groove boyunca
icimde ki asansor boslugu da cabasi
garip bir bonsai geciyor,
sonra Fasli cocuklar,
Lisboa café’de oturuyorlar,

kendi aralarinda kumar oynuyorlar,
hangisinin hile yaptigini anlamakta zorlaniyorum,
hileler bile artik namuslu degil,

avutmuyor simdi beni,
Senden uzak bas donmeleri,
donmeden gecemedigin noktalarin ifadesizligi,
beklemenin kifayetsizligi
uzerimden cikmayan kiyafetsizligi

varmak zor,
yollar var
kaybolmak sart,
bulusmak kurtarmali ikimizi,
biz bilirken kacinilmazi,
hatalar oruyor kacamadiklarimizi……….

Istanbul, eylul’de sis basmis fene halde Karkoy limaninda bekliyorum gelmeni, MMXI

Henri-Marie Beyle, George (Julian Sands) ve Ben sanki E.M Foster aramizda degilmis gibi davraniyoruz, neden acaba?

yeni donmustum
basimda atamadigim
basdonmeleri sonrasinda yasanan garip med-cezirler,
Santa Croce kilisesinde duserken,
Julian oturmus,
bana oyle bakarken
hic birsey olmamis gibi,
elimden tutarken,


Stendhal sendromundan yeni kurtulmustum,
baska bir hayatin ozlemi icimde
baska adamlarin tuzak kurmus gecmisi,
paralel yiginlar arasinda….
kendi mabedinde uzak yatarken herseye
yaralar acitmazken eski kadar
yarinlar eskimezken eskisi kadar

canimin ne memen birsey istemisinden daha dogal ne olabilirdi,
bu nemem sey gunlere,
saatlere,
gectigim sokaklara
paralel hizla degisiyordu,
ama hep bir noktada
beni baska noktalara tasidiginin farkinda…..


evet kendimi hakli bulabilirdim bu noktada,
canimin istemesi yeterliydi
ki ben bunu bilmiyordum,
bundan daha masum ne olabilirdi ki….
olasiliklar ekseninde
kargasadan geride
kendi hasiralti edilmis
belirsizlik suzgecinde
yoksa igdis edilmis
Politik direnisler arifesinde….
sezginlikten arindirilmis
yagmur gibi

bugun 7 kez
yedi tepenin bilmedigim yedi tepesinin disindaki
yedi tepe boyunca yolalirken
yedinci ayda dogan ben
yedi aylik,
yedinci gun,
ve 7sularinda ki
tesadufleri hic dusunmemistim


yasadigim kentler gibiydi hersey,
sanki Trastevere’de heryol Piazza San Egidio’ya cikiyor,
sanki her sokak Via Corso’ya aciliyor,
sanki her dususumde Alfama’da bilegimi incitiyor,
sanki San Francis’i hep yanlis yerde aradigimi hissediyorum
The Castro sokaklari boyunca....



dususler guzeldir derdin,
ama seni hic tutan olmadigini bilmiyordum ki ben
ondandir diye dusundum Macau’da leylaklar acarken
oysa sen beni Saigon’da beklerken ….



son bulustugumuz noktadan gecerken
bunu neden yaptigimin farkinda olmaksizin
seni kafamdan atamamanin cigliklari
martilardan uzaklarda biryerlerde
leylek misali
Bafa golune vuran dolunayi kiskanan
bir rayiha yayiliyordu …
gecmisimiz boyunca,
Sen ve ben cok uzaktik,
bir o kadar da yakin,
gecmisimize,
gelecegimize
bugunumuze…..

c.cerit & Istanbul&London ekim soguklari bastirmisken, 2011

EMIRGAN

EMIRGAN
Emirgan’da yagmur yoktu bugun,
ne de sahile yanasan yasli vapur,
ne de sahile yansiyan kentin silueti,

icimde bir cosku
Annem sanki icimde olmali
ben degildim, cok yabanci
ve cok tatli…..
uzun sure tuttum icimde bu yeni guzu
annemin olduguna kanaat getirdim,
sonrada kanat taktim
ad taktim kendi kendime
herzamanki gibi
cocukken cizdigim hayal ulkerindeki
hayal kentler gibi
hayali kralliklarimin mutlu cocuguydum ben bir zamanlar


yabanci bir adam vardi yanimda,
Breton olmali,
zeki bulmadigim bir adam,
kolay, kirli ve gereginden fazla salla pati
oldugu gibi olan seyleri sevmeme ragmen
beni yinede rahatsiz eden,
uzun sure dusundum durdum,
bulmaliydim
huzursulugumu yaratan noktayi,
kendimi temize cekmeliydim,
bu faali mechul supheden,
kendimi duze cikarmaliydim,

oysa ki hicbir nedeni yoktu,
anladim ki incelikler yuzunden,


sacma dialoglar ortasinda,
Atli koskun bahcesinde sigara ictik,
guz gelmisti,
Kurbagalar golde Basho’yu hatirlatiyordu,
Baykuslari koruda gorememenin verdigi
hayal kirikligida cabasi
Caba Teyze’ye ne olmustu acaba?
Anneannem oleli yuzyilllik bir yalnizlik girmisti,
Ben artik hesaplamayi untmustum….


Luck Strike iciyorum bugunlerde
fena halde Ay coregine dadandim,
sokakta bagcigim cozulmuyor artik,
mektuplari pulsuz yolluyorum,
yine Gotlar Sütununa ugramiyorum,
Sake'siz ve
Sakabe San’siz
yasam yok artik


Emirgan’da bana bir haller olmustu,
Elimden tutsa bin parcaya ayrilabilirdim,
Vapur o gun kiyiya hic yanasmadi,
ne de ben o gun aglamadim…..

o gun,
Emiragan’in yedi ayri hali vardi,
Icimden gecen,
Yedi tepeli kentte, yedi eylul’de
Yedi farkli noktada kilitlenen,
Yedi noktadan kirilan ……

emirgan, l'été indien , MMXI

Pre-Raphaelite bir yagmur var disarida....

Pre-Raphaelite bir yagmur var disarida,
Lavanta tarlalarinin icinden suzulen,
Pont Benezet’e aciklarinda,

Alexandra laneti gecmisimizde,
lanetli bir kavimin son sozcusu,
Nam June Paik misali,
viyolensel saplantilar,
oysa ben bugun,
Anish Kapoor ritmindeyim,
Bombay Sapphire maviliginde,
bulutlu kapilar onumde,
geciktirilmis ruzgarlar misali,
sessizliginde,
hic olmadigi kadar sensizliginde......
hic sasirmayan haller evresinde....

heyecanlar garip bir adanin aciklarinda beklemekte,
tipki arada guneyden gelen,
garip meltemler misali,
icimde bir sikinti,

kendinden gelen,
kendiliginden gitmeyen,
kendinden ogrenilmis,
kendiliginden ogretilmis,
autodidact bir yazgi,
nedensiz,

annem kimsesiz …….
bir tek cir cir bocekleri,
ve camlar kaldi geride........

IST^ VII^ VII^MMXI^C^ERIT

Hayal adinda bir kiz varmis..............

Hayal adinda bir kiz varmis….

icimden gecerken senin nobetlerin,
olgunlasmamis narlar arifesinde
kendinden gecmis mor salkimlar,
Suzi-dilara makami oncesi,
icimde bir salincak
inmemis cocukluguma yolalirken………..

unuttum ben coktan
adini
adimla birlikte

Sila beni eve almamis cok mu?
zili bozuk olmali,
hay aksi,
Sende bozuksun bana
icimden gecen sozcukler boyunca …..
akortu bozulmus akerdeon mavisinde….
beyhude şu calan plak,
şu akan su,

Hayal adli bir kiz varmis
hayalleri olmayan
Mavi bir treni beklermis
oysa tren seferleri kaldirilmis
yoksa kucuk kiz mi kandirilmis….

olmali………
olasiliklar ekseninde…..

karanlik bir gecede kestane agaclariyla oturdum ben,
gelecek kelebek mevsimini birlikte beklemenin ozleminin yarattigi kaos
ve biz,
bilirdik ki gelecek
gunbatiminda aya yorgi koyunda
ay sahitti
uykusuz gecen geceler boyunca
ates bocekleriyle cevrili eflatun begonviller
ve o tanidik baykus sesleri….

yol boyunca senin guzelligin geliyor aklima
gelincik tarlalarinin pesisira
sonra bir Kazancakis sarkisi
sonra bir kac Kavafis dizesi,
sonrasi yok iste,

kahreden bir sessizlik…..

Isa bile caresiz
Biz ne ki,
Paul Eluard olsaydi yanimda
Elimden tutsaydi elleri……..

Istanbul & july^MMXI, C.CERIT

Hollywood Cerise & ….Sky with Fuchsia Stripes......

ben bugun hicbirsey olamadim,
yarin ne olur bilinmez,
gerci birsey olma hevesim,
20 li yillarda bitmisti,
denemeler gereksizdi,
bosluklar doldurulmuyordu,

sense meshur bir politikaci,
oynadigin rollerin son perdesi,
hic bitmeyen,
ilk gunden beri….

sana pekte yakisan,

tiyatro banelligine bulasmadan,
dekadans olmadan
sen farkinda kilmadan,
sen farkindaliginin farkinda olmaksizin
yercekimi kirilmadan,
elin kimildamadan,
hakikat kizil bir adam,
kendini yankisiz kilmadan,
yakisiz
yakisiksiz
esrik ...ve
eksik.....


aslinda arena ayni,
pazar islak bir ogle sonrasi,
Hollywood Cerise.....

ben mutluyum,
yazarken olesiye…..
peki ya sen

bilmem begenirmisin,
semizotu salatasi,
bilinmeyen bir vals,
radika,
fuxia cizgilerle orulu bir gökyüzü,
deep fuchsia ile pale fuchsia
arasinda gidip gelen.....
ay ciceklerinden olusan bir sonat,
ve carpaccio’dan
olusan bir menu var,

baska birsey yok,
yoksa yok
aliskanliklar degismiyor,

ben bugun hicbirsey olamamanin sensizliginde……

Istanbul &London,  jan7july, MMXI & c.cerit

Kurbagalar Vals Yapiyor Otto Wagner Tapinaklarinda.....

Garp cephesi hareketsiz demek,
Simal ruzgarlari esiyor bugun,
ben bir yaprak,
sark cagiriyor usulca,
sicak bir kan dolaniyor,
gunlerin ustunde,
Iskender misali,
ilerliyor zaman,
gunesin otesinde,

Ahh Theseus nerelerdesin.....
neden Naxos kadar yakin degilsin......

yaralar Hokkaido aciklarinda,
beklerken bir Rembrandt tablosunun akmis tuvalinde,
yagmur sonrasinda
salyangozlar ilerliyor,

mavi bir roka emsali,
kurbagalar vals yapiyor Otto Wagner tapinaklarinda,
Seni bilmem,
Ben yokum simdi buralarda,
adini sen koy,
golge,
iklim,
ikilem,
duzlem,
yer degistirirken
bir Selvinin altinda uyurken,
daldigin duslerle,
icinden cikamadigin…………..
girilemez gizil sularin derinliklerinde……..

c.cerit, 7/7 MMXI Istanbull

Emirgan

Emirgan


urkek bir yagmur yagiyor,
yasli bir vapur yanasiyor,
bir yaz sonesi Shakespearian,
bir cinar nobette,
yaz yagmuru altinda islanmak ne guzel Emirgan’da


Emirgan’da korkar adam yalinizliginda,
adami kovalar,
tahmini bir menzil boyunca,
icinde tasidigin,
durmadan tasindigin,
ihtiyacin yok bu kalabaliga,
caddeler, cinarlar,
olmayan adamlar boyunca

yagmur yagiyor,
vapur yanasiyor,
bir yaz sonesi Victorian,
bir sedir agaci,
Souad Massi sesiyle buyurken,
Sibilla acarken gozlerini gune,
nar ciceklerinin ezgisi icinde,

iste boyle birsey
yaz yagmuru altinda
islanmak ne guzel Emirgan’da
emirgan / istanbul MMX C.CERIT

Sono una stella

Sono una stella del firmamento
che osserva il mondo, disprezza il mondo
e si consuma nel proprio ardore.

Io sono il mare di notte in tempesta
il mare urlante che accumula nuovi
peccati e agli antichi rende mercede.

Sono dal vostro mondo
esiliato di superbia educato, dalla superbia frodato,
io sono il re senza corona.

Son la passione senza parole
senza pietre del focolare, senz'arma nella guerra,
è la mia stessa forza che mi ammala.
     
                                                             Hermann Hesse

deniz saclarin ucusurken.....

ben senin militan ruhunu sevdim,
deniz saclarin ucusurken......

Alfama/ Lisboa & MMVI, c.cerit

Eflatun bir geceye uyanirken.........

Cihangir"e uyanis,
caminin bahcesinde tanimadigim
uyuyan adamlar var,
bir anlik bir cekince yasiyorlar,
sonrada kaldiklari noktadan kent ruyalarina daliyorlar,

oysa ben
kac gundur uykusuz
yaziyorum gormek istedigim ruyalari yatagima,
belki biri yanitlar,
uyuyamiyorum bu utanc ulkesinde,
kendi topraklarinda surgun olan aile bireylerimin sefaletini dusundukce,
uyuyamiyorum Sebahattin Ali sonrasi,
uyuyamiyorum leylak geceleri sonrasi,
ben morsalkim bir hayali terkederken,
uyamiyorum gunesin dogusuna taniklik ettikten sonra,
Roma'da , Cesme'de ve Avignon'da
uyuyamiyorum seffaf mercan kayaliklarinda teninle bulustuktan sonra,
uyuyamiyorum Baso'nun yastik hikayelerini dinledikten sonra
uyuyamiyorum kendimi bildim bileli
uyuyamiyorum kendim oldugumun farkina dustum duseli,
uyuyamiyorum annnemin elini tutmadan yillardir,

herneyse, uykularini bolmedin kendi duslerim ugruna,
Onlarin duslerine ortak olamam,
ama kediler ve agaclar benimle
bu kurtarilmis kucuk camii avlusunda.....

sicaktan bir sis bulutu sariyor bogazi,
gun geciyor
uykusuzluk nobetleri gecmiyor,
kafam bir dunya,
gecenin bir yarisi
galata koprusunun curumekte olan yikintilari
arasinda biryerlerde
bir takaya atliyorum
sarayburnu aciklarinda
hersey duruyor,
yer ve gok
mavi ve mavi
yildizlar suyun icinde
su yildizlarin icinde
oylece parliyorlar
suretleri kavusuyor birbirlerine

futursuz bir manifesto gelip oturuyor
futurist bir eksene
atonal askimizin icerigiyle,
cakismayan bir eksende
nedensizliklerimi koyamiyorum hicbiryere
Tempo perdida caliyor,
portekiz huznu kapliyor,
sarkinin bende yarattigi derinligin,
ustune bir de,
elimdeki bos yazilmamis sayfalar ekleniyor
kirik bir guguk kusu,
ve bir Chagall desenli kravat,
sayfalar elimden ucuyor
birer Chagall kusu edasinda
sahipleri coktan uyumus
denizin ortasinda
yuzlerce sahipsiz bos sayfa
bulusuyor
Bogazin martilariyla......
ben eflatun bir geceye uyanirken.......................
................ikisinin arasinda kalan bir ben
Cihangir & Karakoy - MMX C.CERIT

Alsancak Gar'inda metal bir portakal tadi…..

.......................................................
raylarda yankilanan bir erkek huznu,
gectigi istasyonun adini hatirlamaktan uzak,
olgunlasmamis soguk bir seftali,
sefkat istasyonundan gectiginden bihaber,

yitirilmis erkekligiyle bastirilmis kadinligi arasinda,
sanki atini arayan Kral Lear,
ihtiyaci olan teksey bir at,
yasemin gecelerinde bekletilmis,
bir asphalt kenarina birakilmis,
bir gecede…………
lacivert geceyi bolerken bir at,
A horse, A horse, My Kingdom for a horse....

london ^istanbul l'inverno & MMXI c.cerit

"Everything has a small beginning”

“ Omnium rerum principia parva sunt - Everything has a small beginning”


     Politik tansiyonun gergin oldugu gunler yasiyoruz.Birbiri ardina Kuzey Afrikayi saran isyan bayragi giderek politik bir manifesto kimligiyle, farkli noktalarda, farkli boyutlarda, farkli toplumsal dinamikleri tetikliyor.

      Ozellilkle Kuzey Afrika'da yasanan surec, bu toplumsal ivmenin en acik gostergesi, yuzyillardir emperyalist ulkelerin birer kolonisi olarak varolan, ozgurluk savaslarinin sonrasinda ise, Junta yonetimleri, Diktatatorluk altinda gecen yillar artik, demokratik bir yapiya duyulan ozlemle Kuzey Afrika ulkerinin dortbir yanina sicrayarak buyuk bir isyani dinamitledi….



Araplari ve Berberileri saran bu direnis , 50’li ve 60li yillarin ozgurluk savaslarinin sonrasinda yeni bir vizyonun, aslinda yeniden Phoenixvari bir dogumun mujdecisi….

Tum bu toplumsal surece paralel, karsimiza bu hikayeleri sinematografik vizyon icinde kurgulayan Italyan bir yonetmen cikiyor, Gillo Pontecorvo. Belkide bu sureci algilamak adina en onemli referanslardan biri : Italyan yonetmen Gillo Pontecorvo’nun Cezayir’deki Isyanin, direnisin anatomisini ortaya koydugu, Ic Savasi anlatan kult filmi “La Battaglia di Algeri”, The Battle of Algiers (1966)
Filmle bugunku ozgurluk mucadelesinin, aslinda bircok isyanlarinin sonunda elde edilmis , baski altinda yasayan toplumlarin bir portresiyle karsilasiyoruz.…..

        Gillo Pontecorvo Pisa’da yasayan bir yahudi ailesinin ferdi, Fasist donem Italya'sindan kacip Paris’e yerlesen, 1943-45 arasinda Milano’daki Marxist direnis harekatinin lideri, kendi kisisel yasantisi da , donemin tarihsel kimligine paralel onu onu hep bir isyanci, direnisci, ozgurluk savascisi konuma oturtmasi da, bir o denli heyecan verici…..



The Battle of Algiers siyah beyaz hand held kamerayla cekilen, cinéma-vérité sitilinin en onemli orneklerinden biri. Filmde; ayni eksende sosyal olgularin on planda yeralmasi, doneme ait dokumanter bir kimlik tasimasi, aktuel mekanlarda cekilmesi, ve konvansiyonel sinemanin, Hollywood’un dayattigi star sistemine karsi profesyonel olmayan oyuncularin varligi Neo Realist sinemanin ana hatlarini ortaya cikartmaktadir. Neo-realist yonetmenlerin izlerini tasiyan filmde, ozellikle Roberto Rosellini sinemasina ait espiriler acik ve net bir sekilde gorulebilir.

Film, 130 yillik Fransiz isgalinin kucuk direnislerle, isyanlarla baslayarak, bir ulusun bagimsizlik mucadelesini gozler onune koymakta, ozgurluklerin hic te kolay elde edinilmediginin alti cizilmektedir.

    Bu toplumsal gelisimi algilayabilmemiz icin birde Yakin Dogu ve Arab Dunyasi uzmani Edward Said’in perspektifinden de bakmamiz gerekebilir.

Son gunlerde hersey cok hizli bir sekilde degisirken, ideolojiler anlamlarini coktan yitirmisken, kimlik degistirirken, icleri bosaltilirken, politik krizler, isyanlar yer degistirirken: kendi bireysel varolusumuz adina ortaya konan isyanlarimiz, belkide bu denli, dunya tarihi acisindan onemli bir rol oynamasa da, biz yinede Sysphus’un kaderini tasimanin bilinciyle Homosapiens’in bireysel trajedilerine taniklik ediyoruz.

    Belki bir an icin kent siluetini ele geciren grotesque gokdelenler, Haydarpasa’nin belirsiz bir yangina kurban gitmesi, hergun bir yenisi eklenen Alisveris Merkezleri, Dogudan goc olgusunun yarattigi kaos ve dejenerasyon, , kentin dokusunun yokloma tehlikesi, yanlis ve tarihi dokuya paralel olmayan restorasyonlar, Londra’daki ogrenci eylemleri; insanin icinde isyan bayragini acan kucuk detaylar mi, yoksa toplumsal, tarihsel, estetik, bellek ve kultur adina politik saptamalar ve movement’larida iceren, ciddi birer sosyolojik, demografik, toplumsal olgular mi, Siz ne dersiniz?

    Herneyse, Cezayir Ic Savasini, buyuk bir isyanin sonrasinda elde edilen zaferi anlatan bu film, yine bugunlerde ayni sicak gundemi yakalayan harekatlarin altinda yatan tum olgularin altinin cizildigi en carpici orneklerden biri , Iyi Seyirler…..

Duc De Smyrne & Cuneyt CERIT
Nisan MMI/ Istanbul

“ Omnium rerum principia parva sunt”

“ Omnium rerum principia parva sunt - Everything has a small beginning”


     We are currently living in times of high political tension when riots and demonstrations are spreading across North Africa and Middle East. There have been revolutions in Egypt and Tunisia with major public demonstrations of protest in Algeria and Civil War in Libya.

Post Colonial states became Junta regimes under dictatorships in North Africa and Middle East. After all these struggles for liberty there is still no breeding ground for democracy. Riots spark across the lands and lead to huge public outcries and massive demonstrations.

     European Art Film makers were highly aware of these social and political tensions. One of the definitive faces of European Art Film was the director, Gillo Pontecorvo. Arguably, he is one of the crucially important figures to explain the social circumstance.
    Gillo Pontecorvo, born in Pisa, was the son of a wealthy bourgeois Italian Jewish businessman; he escaped to Paris from the Fascist regime of Mussolini and became an active member of the Italian Communist Party and leader of the Resistance in Milan between 1943-45. He definitely lived an extraordinary life fighting for freedom.

Most of Pontecorvo’s films were highly concerned with political issues. ”The Battle of Algiers” (1966) was directed by Pontecorvo and is considered a masterpiece and widely viewed as one of the finest black and white films of the cinéma-vérité genre ever made. Pontecorvo was profoundly influenced by Rossellini’s style: working with non-professional actors, filming and setting historical subjects in their actual environment and using minimal, often hand-held, camera equipment. The film’s portrayal of the Algerian resistance during the Algerian War follows closely in the footsteps of Neorealist pioneers such as de Santis and Rossellini, employing the use of newsreel-style footage, non-professional actors and focusing primarily on the disenfranchised population, who seldom receive such attention from the general media.



This Neo-realist approach is widely described; he uses a definite social context, a sense of historical actuality and immediacy, political commitment to progressive social change and authentic on-location shooting. His extensive use of non-professional actors and his documentary style of cinematography contrast with the Hollywood Studio system with its classical Hollywood acting style the use of an artificial studio.

Pontecorvo’s conception of political filmmaking was derived from situations where the historical background played a major role but had nuances of personal psychology. The protagonists are struggling in a social atmosphere where they are forced to fight in the name of freedom, liberty, social rights and what makes life worth living. Battle of Algiers is anti-imperialist and anti-colonial and structured by Marxist terminology.

     According to Mike Wayne:”…these signifiers of the crucifixion, the Christian motif of suffering and the religious music, so culturally remote from the story material, de-historicise a specific struggle in time and space, turning a story from anti-colonial liberation movements into timeless tragedy, a universal story, a comment on the human condition and other such depoliticising aesthetic concept….”
      Algeria has suffered 130 years of French military and Colonial occupation (1832-1962) and have lost one million people in their fight to gain their independence from France. The film also shows us the current parallel political issues. How can we describe and interpret these social circumstances profoundly? Should we look from the perspective of the Near East Author Edward Said. Edward Said received much praise for his work, his intimate knowledge of colonial era and in the post-structuralist theory of Foucault, Derrida and others. Edward Said also came to be known as a intellectual public figure who frequently discussed contemporary politics, music, culture, and literature on Arab Worlds & Middle East Territories.

At a time when things are changing fast, ideologies have become inane, lost meaning and political crises and uprisings are ubiquitous, we continue to witness the tragedies of the Homosapiens like the destiny of Sisyphus rolling a marble stone to the top of a hill although we are cognizant that our personal uprisings would not move a rock on earth.

     Think about the grotesque skyscrapers that rising city horizon, an ambiguous case of scorched in a virulent fire in Haydarpaşa Train Station, Shopping Centers besieging the city, degeneration and the atmosphere of chaos accompanied by the immigration from the east, the danger of losing the ambiance in the metropolis, or sloppy & artificial and pseudo restorations, riots and protests of the students in London?

Are these the small details that pull up the red flag in our souls? Or the sociological and demographical phenomena that come with deviations in social, political, cultural and aesthetical understanding? What do you think?



All in all, this is the extraordinary story of film which tells us about how Algerian society gained the freedom, and democratical rights in extreme conditions….well, enjoy the film…..



April/ Istanbul MMXI
Duc De Smyrne & Cuneyt Cerit

Maçka'da Maça Dörtlüsü

cok uzun zaman gecti,
ilk kez senin gulumsemen beni esir aldigindan beri,
o gun bu gun hersey toplaniyor
bilinmeyen coklu merkezde,
benim ruhumsa bir turlu toparlanamiyor….

Maçka'da Maça Dörtlüsü,
bir poker kagidinda toplaniyor yazgin,
elim kotu,
açamıyorum
açamıyorum seni ….

Valide Sultan Cesmesi Yalnizligi, Macka / Istanbul,  Martedi /Marzo/MMXI, C.CERIT

Aşiyan" dan hic kalkmayan vapurlar

Ozluyorum seni,
Bir kirlangic gibi,
Bir dolunay gibi,
Istanbul’da acan bir erguvan gibi,
Aşiyan'dan hic kalkmayan vapurlar gibi,

Sen de cekip git,
Bizi garip bir elin varligina terket….

dur bak, bir an ,
Kassandra firtinasi ustumuzde
lanetinden korktugumuzu belli etmeye korktugumuz
el verirken kör bir dula,
yine bizi bulduya………………

Aşiyan, A.H.Tanpinar'in mezarinda aglanmaz aksamlari, Istanbul, Nisan MMXI, c.cerit

Biscotti Evreni

bir biscotti evreninde
umarsizlik ustune reddedilen giydirmeler,
istemdisi bir varolus,
istenc disi yokuşta  ,
kiriliyor
Kiril bir tablet gibi,
iniyorum varolmayan bir soluk alista
yokuşta ben…
sen her yokoluşunda ………
senin her yolalişinda……




sıkıldım simdi,
ama bu sıkıntı baska
sen bilmezsin,
Zürich sendromu olarak adlandiriyorum ben bugun,
sıkılılırsin da
kimildayamazsin,
Seni icine ceker durur,
takilir kalirsin,
o boyutta,
ama bu Bruksel’dekine pek benzemez,
avuntu pek yoktur,
sıkılırsın......
noktalar boyunca
ama gidemezsin,
olurda
hersey ya….
onu dolduracak birsey bulamazsin ya,
asili durur ya,
Orada, o bosluk
Aziz Thomas parmak soksa diye beklersin…..

Zürich Tren Garinda beklemek anlamsiz beni, soguk bir ay, MMX, C.CERIT

Warwick Avenue’ den gecemiyorum,

Katedral, ay ve metro ucgenine sıkışıyorum
Hamilton Bulvarina cikamiyorum….
giderek siliklesiyorum…
yagmurlara paralel,
a frozen second……
ahhh Simonetta,
Casta Diva calarken dusuyorum,
Warwick Avenue’ den gecemiyorum,
geceleri senin hayaletin sinmis……..



Aaah Simonetta,
eflaltun bir keder icinde yuruyorum….
yanlis cizmis seni Boticelli……..



Warwick Avenue, Ev Yollari, St.John's Wood, MMIX, London, C.CERIT

Nice Pazarinda Zack'in sesi…..

zeytinler sira sira,
bir orkestra senligi,
Nice pazarinda Zack’in sesi
Theresa coktan inmis sahile,
Marakesh’li Brahima’da,
zerafet bu olsa gerek,
Italyan tadinda fransiz asaleti,
daha ne ister bu adam
garip bir aksan var burada,
icimizde olmayan…..
dil rustic fransiz,
deniz daha bir Italyan
gecmis rus bir aristokrat….


Zack’in sesi,

domates kokusu gibi,
yari yesil , yari fransiz,
Sarajevo gecelerinde bekletilmis,
Cordoba’da demlenmis,
Guaymas Sonara'da duslenmis,
kabak cicekleri siestalarindan magdur edilmis,
bir cigan ritmine eslik eden cigal'le.......


iste Zack'in sesi, bir dervis'in koynunda
kimi zaman Douro Kanyonlarinda yikanip
Tuna'da aglayan,
kimi zaman Italya, 
50'li yillardan  postalanmis bir kartpostal,
Oyle birsey,
yesil domatesin olgunlugunda,
Teresa Salgueiro'yu kiskandiran,
Nice Pazarin'da kabak cicekleriyle....
uzaktan circir boceklerinin ninnileriyle.....
cam kozalaklari olgunlasirken,
gunes daha bir parlak bugun......
Eze'de duserken gercekler gunbegun.....


agustos sicaklari, Nice &Menton & Eze, Cote d'Azur, France, MMVIII

24601 then labeled 9430......

Peronlarda sayikliyorum adini……
peronlarda saat tik taklari,
hersey bir ritmin gizemiyle asikar,
hersey bir zig zag duzenin esiri…..
nedense hersey bir digerinin tekrari,
ya da ona oykunen,
ya da onsuz oldurulen,
ya da anlamsiz bir takip seruveninde
hicbiri birbirinden bagimsiz cuzumlenemeyen,
oysa ki Jean Valjean rolu yakismiyor sana.....


bu ikili

siyrilamiyor kendinden,
bu ikilemden
hangi iklimde yazildigindan bihaber yararsiz,
suzikar bir yarasiz,
bilingual bir yalnizlikta…..
Akrep ile yelkovan misali
takip icinde hayellerimiz,
birbirleri olmadan
bir saatin icinde
birbirlerine olumune esir duran,
ayni ritmi kovalayan
tasikardi hissi uyandiran
ne mumkun yasamak, birbirimiz olmaksizin,

bugun, kalbin tam 2bin 460 kez carpti,

belki bir eksik
belki bir fazla
kalp atislarinin kimse farkinda olmadi,
yanindaki Leopar saate bakti......

dokuzu dort geciyor,

arti otuz saniye
olamiyor, olduramiyoruz bir turlu,
aklimin kosesinde bin turlu hayallerin dusmus gercekleri,
bugunku koordinatlari
51° 30′ 28″ N, 0° 7′ 41″ W

yarin ne olur bilinmez,
kivriliyoruz bir saga
bir sola,
yasam devam ediyor,
bir arti, bir eksi bati istikametinde
cikisimiz ertelendi
kilitlenen yollar boyunca….




Toulon & London MMVIII, C.CERIT

PERSONA

PERSONA

         We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars…
                                  Lady Windermere’s Fan, 1892

                           I Love acting, It is so much more real than life…..
                                     The Picture of Dorian Gray, 1891
                                                  Oscar Wilde

Love is not only the only thing worth living for, it is disease, often fatal...
Stendhal

Marlene Dietrich’s aura created a myth. She was at once a prima donna full of attitude, an impossible creature with a husky voice, stunning legs, weird eyebrows, and the way smokes a cigarette that could make the thing actually seem alluring. Marlene Dietrich is a most extra avant-garde persona in Hollywood. She was an icon for over five decades. She was femme fatale, elegant, with ambiguous sexual appeal. Marlene Dietrich was born in Schonberg/ Berlin(1901). Her original name is Maria Magdalene Dietrich.

The Blue Angel is based on Heinrich Mann’s novel it called “Professor Unrat “After the great success of Der Blau Engel (The Blue Angel), Dietrich signed contract and agreed to Paramount’s terms. Dietrich left her local celebrity behind and embarked a voyage into international stardom, under the protégée of Sternberg. She made a spectacular entrance in December 1930, American Film goers were entire to her first film in Hollywood.

Dietrich’s career in United States made her legendary icon. She played extremely ….roles like a mysterious cabaret singer in Morocco, elegant femme de rue in Dishonoured, lost in train avantganza character in Shanghai Express, an portrait of Aristocrat in Scarlett The Empress,


    Stefan Zweig called it at the time “Babylon of the World”. The post-war revolution that profoundly impacted the social atmosphere of Berlin society changed certain rules. The chaos led creative and colourful environment. As a young girl Marlene found herself in Bohemian Life of Berlin. She applied for competition to Marx Reinhardt’s Drama School in Berlin. M.Reinhardt was an infamous impresario in the German Theatre History. He directed most prestigious plays in spectacular venues: The Deutsches Theater, the Kammer Spiele, Grosses Schauspiel Haus.

She had played a few minor roles in Reinhardt’s productions. The Taming of the Shrew and A Mid Summer Nights Dream (1923).Her debut professional appearance with a movie camera, she made an impromptu screen test in 1922. Directed by a young Photographer Stefan Lorant. But her first encounter was in 1923,the costume drama-film called “Der Kleine Napoleon”(The Little Napoleon) She played a role as a maid who helps the courtesan to escape from Napoleon’s Younger Brother Jerome. Dietrich kept working hard both direction, stage and films. Arthur Labson’s Manon Lescaut(1926),became the first film of Dietrich’s career to be shown in United States. Marlene Dietrich’s momentum continued.

Joseph Von Sternberg, as this is the director whose name it springs to mind most inseparable couple of Cinema, like the other German Auteur R.W. Fassbinder and Hanna Schygulla, or Helmut Berger and Visconti. He is the person who was inextricably linked with Marlene Dietrich’s extraordinary transformation into a legendary icon, and he gave her international reputation as a world famous star. Joseph von Sternbeg was another example of Autodidact Author with strong discipline, like the other celebrated autodidact and dictator director Charles Chaplin. Austrian Émigré director Joseph von Sternberg had brilliant career in Hollywood and his own power at the Paramount Studios. J. Von Sternberg moved to Berlin for his new project in the name of UFA. Joseph Von Sternberg had been granted enormous powers by UFA, which is also easy connection to help to Jannings Film an entrée to the United States Market. Der Blau Engel(The Blue Angel,1930),was a vitally significant project, but the protagonist actress role wouldn’t become clear? The thing is who would she be? That part was the most speculative nominee audition for the right cast picture.. Joseph von Sternberg described his image that was already in his own mind’s eye….”here was not only a model who had been designed by Rops, but Toulouse Lautrec would have turned a couple of handsprings had he laid eyes on her.
 
 
Her appearance was ideal: what she did with it was something else again. That would be my concern….”


Dietrich came to stage, and she performed with great élan. She was quite cool to handle enough. Marlene Dietrich became the muse of Joseph Von Sternberg. That was the beginning of journey, collaboration with Marlene for to create those immortal masterpiece films in Hollywood. Marlene Dietrich was lucky, because her previous films performance show she were coquette rather than an enigmatic-mysterious femme fatale. Her Persona was hiding in someway. Finally it is significant that Joseph von Sternberg realized its potential in her stage performance instead of using her film references. By the other way, she had no any strong artistic connections like the other actresses which gave those actresses (like Brigitte Helm or Lucie Mannheim) a privilege status in the inner circle of Berlin Film Business.

Joseph Von Sternberg instructed her, and she became most iconic figure in the Hollywood Stars. After great success of Der Blau Engel (The Blue Angel), Dietrich signed contract and agreed to Paramount’s terms. In the Studio Years, Paramount called European Sophistication, and working with some European directors like Ernst Lubitsch, and Josef von Sternberg.

Marlene Dietrich, She arrived in New York on April 9, 1930.In her American debut with “Morocco” in 1930. Morocco was the first film on Dietrich and Sternberg collaborated in Hollywood. After first film, their work together spanned 5 years and 6 movies in Hollywood...

Morocco where Dietrich as Amy, a cabaret chanteuse in black tuxedo, and top hat, she roaming around and singing a chanson with her husky voice, and she moves rapidly forward to kiss a lady, just on front of Foreign Legionnaires and Rich Tourist gazed at the surprising scene with staring eyes. She was unconventional figure on the Hollywood Scenery. This extra avant-garde sense created by Sternberg. He was the one of remarkable director of cinema’s allure and most elaborate stylist. This kind of female protagonist image was contrast to predominant female image of Hollywood Star System. The Depression time female protagonist at Warner Brothers was the gold diggers. Joan Blondell and Glenda Farrell played roles the type gold diggers. But also in the time was unlike stereotype heroines like Key Francis. The most of the Stars under the heavy contract which highly competition with several other major Studios. MGM’s Swedish Star Greta Garbo and sensational Katherine Hepburn were labelled box-office. And the other side is Warner’s infamous revolutionary star Bette Davis. The case of Bette Davis was really unexpected. Maria La Place’s article on Bette Davis”….

Davis came to signify rebellion against male authority, demand for control over her work, the struggle for autonomy and artistic integrity. In the context of the Thirties, it is remarkable kind of signification for a woman. Even more remarkable is the fact that Davis went on to greater success and power throughout the period under consideration without overt punishment….”

Morocco, Maghrib is such an abstract territory, being in the middle of no where or metaphorically not belongs to anywhere, the atmosphere in 1930’s shocking liberation, imperialist desires and human borders mixed up; we understand clearly terror, delight, sexual lust, exhibitionism, passion. In the sense of Paul Bowles or the other Flaneurs. ( Paul Bowles became icons of the expatriates&bohémien centered in Tangier.) Amy Jolly (Dietrich), She is a cabaret singer, she sings the ambiguously titled” what am I bid for my apples” to the macho men of Legion, and expatriate elites in the principal Night Club, soon after fell in love with a simple legionnaire Tom Brown (Cooper), but hung around with rich guy and finally Dietrich in an evening gown shedding her cocotte’s life style ,abandoning a sweet millionaire ,walking off through the Moorish town Gateway in the company of bunch of conscious local women on the desert towards the disappearing legion and her lover. In Morocco, she is the embodiment of self-consciousness and desire of exotic territories melancholy.

The performances of Dietrich in each composition and framing, gesture, facial expression, vocal toning is marked by Sternberg’s authority, highly stylized and meticulously selected and manipulated by Sternberg himself. That’s make Sternberg is a master of certain manners and an Author of the Cinema’s delicate and most fine stylist. His manner reflects the connection between director and painter.’Mise-en scene that primarily reference of Sternbergian Style.

The other most confound point is Sternberg’s heroine sculpted and painted. That physical extension shocks us like in Renoir. The type of visual experience is sculpture in motion. When Amy Jolly seizes up Menjou, a particular manner of Sternberg’s films are partially theatrical, they are located by the special nature of their actions. In Morocco, Sternberg’s shots noonday sun that creates a shadow filled atmosphere.

According to Carole Zucker ….”The acting is theatrical in two senses. First, because it transgresses the type of expressive behaviour that is considered “life-like” in films. ‘Theatricality in ordinary life consists in the resort to this special grammar of composed behaviour; it is when we suspect that behaviour is being composed according to this grammar of…conventions that we regard it as theatrical. We feel that we are in the presence of some action which has been devised to transmit beliefs, attitudes and feeling of a kind that the composer wishes us to have.’ An example this type behaviour in Morocco occurs when Dietrich is brought into Ulrich Hauptmann’s (Captain Caesar) office, where Gary Cooper is being held for his assault on two Arabs the previous night….The second way of the performance in Sternberg’s films are theatrical is their utilization of behaviour and conditions peculiar to the stage. The Dressing room shot between Paul Porcasi and Dietrich provides examples of the various ways in which the performances are invested with theatricality…”

Dietrich second film was “Dishonoured “(1931), directed by Von Sternberg. Marlene’s cod name X-27 was the original title of World War I. espionage melodrama which she played like a legendary Mata Hari. Dietrich is cast as an officer’s widow who has taken the direction as a prostitute than later o joining to Secret Service. Dietrich, particularly in Dishonoured, kind of her frozen figure, mechanic gesture, only thing is all body language. Sternberg used certain angle to create heroic gesture of Dietrich.

Shanghai Express was the third project Dietrich with Von Sternberg. The story of a group of passenger held hostage by a Chinese, the train voyage along from Beijing to Shanghai, extremely existentialist platform, under the symbolic Kanji characters, lights and shade alternating in its corridors and couchette wagons, travellers and the unknown geography. China is the other exotic platform, as a chosen subject matter as desirable exotic territory, evocative and erotic. Marlene, the creature of the half-light and demi-monde is Shanghai Lily, the chiaroscuro she constantly moves in establish that her majestic statue, like goodness is only half obscured by her worldliness.

Carole Zucker writes:”….Dietrich’s de-eroticization is comparable to the suppression of the erotic among the figures in icon painting. (In many icons it is not only the intimation of the erotic that is checked, but gender identity, acknowledged only by pictorial convention, is also concealed.) In Sternberg’s films the narratives centre on the Dietrich figure’s love affairs; it is implied that she has known and knows of a world which partakes of erotic. And yet all glimpses of Dietrich engaged in amatory acts are expressly forbidden. More important than the denial of explicit sexual acts (which may constitute a part of eroticism) is the mode in which Dietrich is represented. In order for Dietrich to truly obtain a quality of eroticism she would have to be presented as a more “real” being. Eroticism is a part of a condition of humanness from which Dietrich is excluded; the many formal strategies previously enumerated withdraw her from the vital existence that embraces the erotic. The moment of erotic recognition of Dietrich that is continually promised is obstructed use it would communicate an intimacy to the spectator and to Dietrich’s fellow actors that is expressly prohibited by laws of the Sternbergian world….”

Blonde Venus (1932), the simple story is a mother’s affection for her child. In Blonde Venus, Herbert Marshall falls in love with Helen (Dietrich) when he sees her swimming nude in the Black Forrest like a nymph. The truth is Marshall fell in love with a fairy tale, an image. His frustration makes him obsessive and transforms the lover a monster. When Dietrich back to her stage career, to except even invite sexual enslavement by a rich protégé and re-enter into the ambience of around of night-clubs acts with sado-masochistic trapping. The general concept of the film is structured on classical Hollywood themes where the woman struggle economically, sexually, and double standard of matriarchal society. Blonde Venus in particularly plays over the family breakdown syndrome, and the reflection and child’s separation from his mother. In Blonde Venus, Carry Grant plays a wealthy businessman who helps Helen/Dietrich, she became his mistress.

Blonde Venus is the film in which the Hollywood and extra-avant-garde manners of Sternberg’s work are controversially linked. Blonde Venus was intended to be a similarity that American Audience could familiar identify in term of the parallel concept it showed with films from the other Studios.

There also interestingly parallel thematic between two major Studios, MGM and Paramount, it’s kind of secret deal between Garbo’s film subjects and Dietrich’s which suggests that each studio. For Garbo’s Mata Hari there is Dietrich’s Dishonoured, for Grand Hotel there is Shanghai Express, for Susan Lenox: Her Fall and Rise there is Blonde Venus, and finally Queen Christina there is Catherine The Great (The Scarlet Empress ).

       The Scarlet Empress (1934), the film contains the extraordinary master pieces of lighting effects in the Cinema History. Von Sternberg transformed Dietrich into an icon Madonna, particularly the sequence the glint of a teardrop diamond she is fondling against her cheek, restore the hardness to her looks and suggest the harsh rule of the future Empress of Russia. Dietrich as a courtesan Empress: with ambiguous reference uniform she slips on for her coup d’etat and her transvestite cabaret uniform. She is in the middle of conspiracies of love, passion, power and perversion in the baroque court. Dietrich’s sexuality is remained surface through the exercise of destructive reign. Political despotism and sexual dominance combine into sadistic pleasure. In Shanghai Express, the acting style becomes more mature, remarkably refined. Her poses extends her ability, the moment of indulgencing herself. Laura Mulvey interprets radical use of Freudian and Lacanian perspective,” Sternberg’s ‘fetishistic scopophilia ‘and Hitchcock’s sadistic voyeurism. Both alternatives are phallocentric: both depend on ‘the image of castrated woman’…”

“The Devil is a Woman”, (1935) the last film which Von Sternberg made with Marlene Dietrich. The Devil is a Woman novel by Pierre Louys, and the script written by John Dos Passos and Sam Winston. Dos Passos, his major work is the U.S.A trilogy, comprising The 42nd Parallel (1930), 1919 (1932), and The Big Money (1936). Doss Passos as a leaing novelis his days, he moved to Hollywood to be a screenwriter like Faulkner ( films of Howard Hawks ), he had frequented with good friends Fernand Leger, Ernest Hemingway, Blaise Cendrars.

“The Devil is a Woman”, Concha who humiliates her men for no other reason than for her super-ego and perversity. She is the one of cold portrait, betrayer in the name of her desires, and female sadist to the male masochist.

Von Sternberg left Paramount for Colombia Pictures. His contract was cancelled, because; his refusal to compromise with the studio system and by his own profligate style. His next project was The Crime& Punishment, Sternberg transformed Dostoyevsky’s classic to the cinematographic vision. He created a Kafkaesque fable, dark dreams, and ambiguous still life portraits with Peter Lorre. It’s is the unexpected combination in the name of Cinematographic Adventure: Dostoyevsky, Lorre and Sternberg…

The conclusion is Von Sternberg’s works for well deserved to profound analyse than the speculative shimmering of his extra avant-garde style or baroque camp. There is highly political concern, social critics, and the structure revolutionist, expressionist, proto-feminist, marginal, provocative, iconoclast for the Studio Years, in the Thirties, in these films with his muse Dietrich. Particularly most of the individual elements in his films: especially lighting schemes produces profoundly expressionist and evocative scenes. Dietrich becomes an Icon.
According to Susan Sontag….”the hallmark of Camp is the spirit of extravagance. Camp is a woman walking around in a dress made of tree million feathers. Camp is the painting of Carlo Crivelli, with their real jewels and trompe-l’oeil insect and cracks in the masonry. Camp is the outrageous aestheticism of Steinberg’s six American movies with Marlene Dietrich, all six, but especially the last, Devil Is a Woman….In Camp there is often something demesure in the quality of the ambition, not only in the style of the work it self….”

      Generally, women have been portrayed in the Studio Years of Hollywood movies as pathetic, sacrificial, and passive. Their roles are frequently constructed within patriarchal norms and they function as ideal house-wives, bad girls and good girls, objects of desire, perfect mother or great educators. They live without self-determination and without individuality. Hollywood female characters are typically products of cliché and stereotypical male point of views. There are a few exceptional directors during the Studio Years, like Howard Hawks and Frank Capra. Howard Hawks he is an infinity modernist Author, he offers to audiences exceptional Modern female portraits. Hawksian women play self conscious roles and posses’ remarkable self awareness. Marlene Dietrich and Sternberg films were strongly characterised and coded with intellectual terminology. Sternberg left behind gigantic mark for female screen personae in terms of pre-coded types. Dietrich image is extremely unique. Sternberg developed a unique visual experience and auditory style. Her image is quite unusual, unconventional in Hollywood Scene. Hollywood norms tend to hold the traditional values, dominant moral issues, subcultural meaning in check, but Sternberg vision was deconstructive, anarchist, exhibitionist, his perspective offer a radically critique of patriarchal convention. Dietrich’s radical manifesto as appeal was magical. Dietrich is a most paradoxical persona: often wearing trousers, femme fatale, to adopt posture of men, vamp, standing with legs spread, sexually domineering women, and arms akimbo.


      She became an icon who acted stardom, extra avant-garde figure on the stage. She was also provocative and controversial. In the context of the Thirties, Sternberg and Marlene were marginal figures in Hollywood. Dietrich & Sternberg collaboration was an extra ordinary partnership in Hollywood. Sternberg’s films insist that life is not a subject to moral cliché. Dietrich’s persona clearly derives from Christian Iconography to Muse of Modern Times. Dietrich’s persona obviously derives from femme fatale aspect inspired by her creator’s alter-ego, like the way Oscar Wilde’s Salome. Sternberg one of the last dandies, his words “Marlene is not Marlene in my films, let’s get that clear. Marlene is not Marlene, I am Marlene, Marlene is me, and she knows better than anyone.”

Sternberg’s films occupy a unique platform where the star system built that Sternberg himself presented Marlene as star. Stenberg identified to himself the value of the star. Morocco is the perfect example of Sternberg’s relations with Marlene .La Bessiere’s behaviour since the early scenes as the protector and suitor of Marlene. In the port scene, he just wants to help her, and gives her card for any help.

      Marlene’s persona built up under the tutelage of master’s vision. Bill Nichols who notes on Sternberg “…. Promises pleasure in a context of presence and absence, hide and seek…he stresses the tenuous alliance between our belief in the illusion and our belief in its reality. He threatens to unveil a scandal before our very eyes; he invites us to play in the gap, the wedgelike opening that his style unveils...”

Marlene Dietrich, She became Hollywood’s star of glamour, allure, and mystique. She is the one of most sophisticated and extremely fetishist. Dietrich is a body of pure Art, she become a form of aestheticism. Dietrich body’s an ambiguous platform of sexual symbols.

In the Thirties it is an actor presented slightly different form as being desirable and attractive in a man with sexual ambiguity. Carry Grant is also phenomenon actor in the Studio Years. His persona developed by Screw-ball Comedies which he plays naïve, boyish/childish characters. His representation of heterosexual personality which is so different approach in the period of the actors. Carry Grant is signalled as different from most of the Hollywood Actors; his performance is integrally linked with Homosexual manners. The Central couples of screw-ball comedies are in the films metaphorically integrated the play action means liberating non-phallic energy. Screwball films to signify in the terms of recovered infantile polymorphous ness.

The case of Carry Grant, there is clearly connection which is something like personae of a positive reference for bisexuality.

     Marlene Dietrich was a close friend and companion of Max Reinhardt, friend of Hemingway, and being romantically linked some of Hollywood playboys, actors like Yul Brynner, Frank Sinatra, Boyer, and Remarque… She had great love affair with French Actor Jean Gabin and some romantic affairs with actresses Ona Manson and writer Mercedes De Acosta ( Greta’s friend too ).Undoubtedly, Marlene Dietrich’s legend still with us, ‘Lili Marlene’ the marching song of her and we still singing “Falling in Love Again”….

MMVI & LONDON, C.CERIT

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Zucker, Carole, The Idea of the Image: Joseph Von Sternberg’s Dietrich Films, Associated University Presses, Inc., 1988

Baxter, John, The Cinema of Joseph Von Sternberg, Barnes&Co.NY, 1971

Baxter, Peter, Sternberg, Paramount and America, (BFI, 1993)

Baxter, Peter, Sternberg, (BFI, 1980)

Nichols, Bill Ideology and the Image, Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1981

Mulvey, Laura, “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema”, Screen 16,no.3 (1975)

Sontag, Susan, Against Interpretation, New York: Delta, 1966

Sternberg, Josef Von, Fun in a Chinese Laundry, San Francisco: Mercury House, 1988

Carr, Larry, Four Fabulous Faces: Garbo, Dietrich, Crawford and Swanson, Galahad,

New York, 1978

Sarris, Andrew, The Film of Josef von Sternberg. New York, The Museum of Modern Art, 1966

EUROPEAN ART CINEMA

                                                       

                             Cinema is truth twenty-for times a second.
                                     Le Petit Soldat, Jean Luc Godard

Cinema is interesting because it seizes life and the mortal side of life.
Jean Luc Godard



Nous vivons dans l’oubli de nos metamorphoses
Mais cet echo qui roule tout le long du jour
Cet echo hors du temps d’angoisse ou de caresses
Sommes nous pres on loin de notre conscience
Le Capital de la Douleur, Paul Eluard

         In 1895, The Luimiere Brothers in Paris and The Skadanowsky Brothers in Berlin organized the very first cinematographic events. In space of twenty years, cinema became a major industry both economically and culturally in Europe.

The two World Wars drained and deeply affected Europe physically, economically, culturally and artistically. Particularly during the Second World War which saw huge migration of intellectual émigrés to the United States, especially German Film-makers, actors and technical staff. This influx of European film makers in the States led to the rise of America as a leader in the Cinema Industry.

The post-war period in Europe was quite a struggle as systems and institutions had to be re-built & revised to try to deal with the new period of hardship and recovery. It was time to establish a new cinema language, a re-birth from the ruins, like Phoenix, after the latest war and the fall of Fascism. Devastated by World War II., and after the German occupation, Italy was then occupied by the Allied troops. In fact, the struggle of Italy’s civilian population to live normal, day-to-day lives under the extraordinarily heavy conditions and difficulties of changing occupations in their country (and the new cultural and political influences they brought with them), was almost unbearable for a people who were also trying to hold onto their own cultural identity and consciously doing what they could to resist these occupations. Upon the end of the Second World War, Italy descended into social chaos having lost their leadership & with thousands of displaced people wandering the country, no hope was given from the Christian Democrats or Communist Party (PCI). Up to that point, religion, the Vatican, had been relied upon to dictate social values; the Catholic Church has always had a profound impact and effect on Italy’s social and political perspective. The Catholic Church and politicians have always been involved in various systematic corruption and scandals. That is the clear statement of the socio-political background of Italy. Under the Allied Troops, the Italian film industry had no brilliant days.

The American, Admiral Stone (the chairman of the Allied Film Board) made quite a strange declaration; Italy did not need a film industry and should not be allowed to have one. There were also practical considerations and reasons for this; the studios and the cinema industry itself were in ruins and had collapsed. In those days, Italian film-makers transformed the country’s reality into the cinematographic vision.

     The most notable characteristics of Italian Neo-Realist expression are the post-war period of Italian socio-economic structure, daily routines, portraits of the proletariat, social truth, re-structuring, re-building and the social panorama of Italy. The new breed of Italian film-makers all explored the link between social reality and political statutes, and challenged the moral values of postwar Italian society. The other major issue was using non-professional actors, like an ordinary man from the street. It was the time of slogans: no more professional actors, no more artificial decors, no more sets, and no more cliché stories. It was time for the kinds of films in which observations were being made of the social circumstances in which the Italians were living. Simply observing how this society was dealing with this incredibly tough situation: what’s the meaning of survival syndrome, paradoxical human conditions and ethics. The subject matter involved life among the impoverished and the proletariat.

The aim was to depict characters marked by simplicity. According to Bazin,”realism can only occupy in art a dialectical position - it is more a reaction than a truth…”

And he added,”…neorealism knows only immanence. Is it from appearance only, the simple appearance of being and of the world, that it knows how to deduce the ideas that it unearths. It is a phenomenology….”

The leading authors of the period are; Vittoria De Sica, Roberto Rosselini, Luchino Visconti.

      One of the cult films of the period is I Ladri Di Bicicletta which involved similar principles; a story about the daily life of the lower classes. The film was released in the street. I Ladri di Bicicletta is the story of wandering around Rome with a child and his father. The city has no glamour, elegance or charm.
It has social significance for the period. It was just a simple story: Antonio Riccio, the protagonist of the film, is an unemployed worker who finally manages to get a job after desperately searching but he must first procure a bicycle, necessary for the job. When his bike is stolen the story turns sharply to Antonio’s mad search for his stolen bike with his little son. After the bicycle disappears, Antonio becomes increasingly aggressive towards and, at the same time, distant from his son, completely insecure, lost and sceptical about society.


Another interesting anecdote about the period is that Neorealist films generally feature children in protagonist identity, though their roles are frequently more observational than participatory.

From the Neo-Realism perspective, the children played key roles as observers of the difficulties of the emerging present who held the key to the future.

One of the other remarkable directors of the period was Luchino Visconti, and his cult film La Terra Trema (The Earth Trembles, 1948) La Terra Trema is structured in a semi-documentary realist style. The film starred only non-professional actors & was filmed in the Sicilian fishing village called Aci Trezza. It’s a story about a Sicilian family struggling with the harshness of nature and commercial reality.

Italian Neo- Realism developed in parallel with Italian Post World War II literature. Notable novelists of the time being, Pavese and Vittorini.

Italian Neo-Realism was inspired by French cinema verite, German Kammerspiel, the documentary movement in the States and Polish Film School. The movement of French New Wave was profoundly influenced by Italian New Realism.
    Within La Nouvelle Vague, The French New Wave, collaborations between cinephiles & theorists flourished.
Leading directors of the period are: Jean Luc Godard, Francoise Truffaut, Claude Chabrol, Jacques Rivette, and Erich Rohmer who were to become the auteurs of the French Cinematographic Manifesto.

      Jean Luc Godard was considered the enfant terrible of the new cinema. Jean Luc Godard is one of the most important film directors of La Nouvelle Vague.Godard’s films are structured as philosophical language. He was terrifically creative, also the most extroverted, his work weaved together rich veins of implicit political views and profoundly personal endeavours (existentialist, modernist, poetic, sci-fiction, abstract, spontaneous, romantic} and was concerned with film language and logic in any artistic genre. His sinuous roots encompass a broad scale of intellect and sensibilities from Bach to Renoir, Nietzsche to Hegel, and Brecht to Rosselini. He had a leading intellectual influence on French Cinema. Le Mepris is an adaptation from a novel by Italian Writer Moravia translated as A Ghost At Noon. Le Mepris directed by Jean Luc Godard made a film extremely self-conscious, modernist, and highly stylized. Le Mepris was based on love story narrative.



Jonathan Romney interprets Le Mepris,”…Le Mepris is a film about ghosts. It begins in Rome’s Cinecitta studios with Palance be-moaning the worldwide decline of studio system, the end of cinema.Cinecitta is a ghost town, and Lang, wandering through its ruins, is it s most noble phantom…” Le Mepris is about cinema, and Fritz Lang in the role of himself. Cinema has the face of Fritz Lang who made masterpieces of Cinema history like Metropolis (1927), M Murder (1931) and a handful of great Hollywood film noir.

Bridget Bardot becomes a phenomenon like G.Garbo and M.Dietrich. Godard created a modern portrait of women who have self-determination and also many layered complexity: at once illogical, regal, mysterious, capricious, disarming and exasperating.

       Le Mepris is an incredibly rich-text, affectionately drawing from European cultural heritage. Godard completely admired European Culture and notions: Homer, Holderlin, and B. Brecht. The story is about struggling European intellectuals, the clichés of love, miscommunication, alienation, the sharing of European culture, Brechtian distance and German philosophy. The film is a tower of Babel, in which the characters struggle to understand each other; Italian, French, German, and English. Prokosch is an American producer who was able to speak only English as a symbol of the monopolistic and imperialistic approach of Hollywood. The film surrounded by, and full of, strong cinematic personas such as Jack Palance, Bridget Bardot, and Michel Piccoli with European coproducer, Joseph Levine (French) and Carlo Ponti (Italian).



      European Art Film makers were also highly politically aware of social tension. One of the different faces of European Art Film was the director Gillo Pontecorvo.
The Battle of Algiers (1966) was directed by Pontecorvo. Most of Pontecorvo’s films were highly concerned with political issues. Pontecorvo has profoundly influenced by Rossellini’s style: working with non-professional actors, filming historical subjects in the actual environment as the setting and using minimal camera equipment (hand held etc). Pontecorvo had almost the same ideals as those with a Neorealist vision.

Pontecorvo’s conception of political filmmaking was derived from situations where the historical background played a major role, with nuances of personal psychology. The protagonists are struggling in a social atmosphere where they are forced to fight in the name of freedom, liberty, social rights and what makes life worth for living. Battle of Algiers is anti-imperialist and anticolonist, and structured by Marxist terminology. According to Mike Wayne,”…these signifiers of the crucifixion, the Christian motif of suffering and the religious music, so culturally remote from the story material, de-historicise a specific struggle in time and space, turning a story from anti-colonial liberation movements into timeless tragedy, a universal story, a comment on the human condition and other such depoliticising aesthetic concept….”



The 1970’s and 1980’s was quite a challenging period for the Euro-Med Countries. It was a period of struggle for Democracy and freedom. Some countries, like Spain and Portugal, were under the dictatorships. Others, like Turkey (coup d’etat, 1970 and 1980) and Greece (military junta of 1967-1974- it called also the regime of the colonels), were under military-oligarchy regimes. In Portugal, Antonio de Oliveira Salazar began governing by anti-democratic, anti-parliamentarian, fascist and Catholic methods. Meanwhile, Italian militants started to kill judges and some civil servants from both left and right wing fractions. These are the general socio-political characteristics of the panorama of the Euro-Med Countries.

Spain was under the fascist dictator, Franco, for over forty years. Franco’s rebellion sparked off the civil war in Spain. He was allied even with Nazis during the Second World War. The German Condor-legion, made infamous by the bombing of Guernica, provided air support for The Nationalists. Guernica is an unforgettable tragedy and a shameful blight on the history of Spain. The heart of Franco’s government was Castilian, which offered no rights for the other ethnic nations in the Iberian Peninsula, like Catalan and Basque Countries. When Franco chose his heir, Juan Carlos, the dictatorial regime had been transformed into a pluralistic democracy without civil war. The democratic transition led by Spain rapidly transformed with another dimension. The period of political repression fell, barriers were broken and the limits pushed. It was time for the flourishing and rising period of Spain. The 80’s paralleled the new freedom, cultural re-birth, general blossoming all over Spanish cultural life. That movement was followed by Spain’s joining The European Union and the socio-economic reforms adapted rapidly during the leadership of the Socialist Party under Felibe Gonzales . In the 90’s, progress had been absolutely and surprisingly established successfully. Madrid was declared the cultural capital of Europe in 1992, and Barcelona hosted the Olympics in the same year. The post Franco period of the mid 80’s was characterised by an ambience of celebration led by the new generation of Spanish film-makers. One of those being Pedro Almodovar.

Almodovar is a highly regarded and well-known contemporary director from Europe, respected by an international audience.
Tacones Lejones (High Heels, 1991), Almodovar based the story on the Hollywood melodramas of the 1940’s and 1950’s and transformed postmodern comedy- melodrama.
     High Heels closely related to Douglas Sirk’s Imitation of Life (1959), certain parallels are formed with American traditional Melodrama but in the Spanish way.
      Tacones Lejones would have been similarly based on F. Garcia Lorca’s play The House of Brenarda Alba. The story is about a domineering mother and her two daughters, who leave home in the name of freedom, escaping the mother’s tyranny.In High Heel, the story is set between mother and daughter, all cacophony and entanglement.
Tacones Lejanos’s heroines are characteristic of the Almodovarian existence. Almodovar drew a portrait of the stereotypical career woman and the sacrificial mother, the central theme of the film is motherhood and is shown in a variety of representations. Initially the women are shown performing. One a singer, the other a TV presenter.

Mother Becky is a glamour singer; daughter Rebecca is a TV presenter who’s emotionally linked to her past childhood trauma. Miguel Bose’s (the son of Lucia Bose who was quite a famous actress for Bunuel, Antonioni, and Fellini) triple role as three different personalities of male gender: drag queen Letal (miming the hit song of Rebecca’s mother”Un ano de Amor” (A Year of Love), undercover cop Hugo and judge Dominguez. Judge Dominguez and his unforgettable eccentric mother image. He can’t survive without her presence; she is the one who knows all the details of celebrities. She can handle all investigative stories (even from her bed) and interestingly with the absence of a father figure in his life. How daring was her influence on his life? He is the most notable and intriguing male character in the film. Through this film, Almodovar is playing where the profound psychological phenomenon of paradoxical ways confound like a griffith narrative. Dress by or Persona…kind of different existence of Fernando Pessoa….Also the relationship between Letal and Rebecca is completely absurd and ironical, because Rebecca slept with Letal who’s imitating her mother. In sequence where Rebecca has sexual intercourse with Letal, who had been dressed as her mother, as metaphorically he had irresistibly taken her place. Sleeping with the mother image, unpredictable incest. Femme Letal’s impersonation of her mother has a more realistic quality than Becky’s own existence.

Almodovar draws such performances from his actors that he also plays a crucial role: compelling, eccentric, enigmatic, zany, wacky, camp, neurotic, hysteric characters. Completely cliché, kitsch, tacky tele-novellas. Almodovar enlarges on romance as it is shown in daily TV soap-opera.

The glamour world also has artifice, imitation, and a synthetic life style where women are under the meta-fetishism. The film shows us the pleasure that can be had with female accessories such as Armani suits, Channel bags etc.

      The central characters in the film are two charismatic female protagonists played by eccentric and vivid actresses; Victoria Abril and Marisa Paredes .Woman are at the centre of almost all of Almodovar’s films as his alter-ego. Generally, Almodovar’s characters have strong personalities and exist in a variety of complex situations, mostly within a highly repressed atmosphere in terms of the socio-psychological background. The film truly bears Almodovar’s own mark, where meticulous combinations meet his particular style and concerns. His films have played a vital role in explaining Spanish culture through overblown sketches of life. Almodovar’s camp style is outrageous, extra avant-garde, decadent, kitsch, socially iconoclastic, affectionate, obsessed, frantic, and completely free of apolitics. Susan Sontag’s article, Notes on Camp, defined a parallel sensibility as the way for an intellectual approach. She said…..”Camp is a certain mode of Aestheticism .It is one way of seeing the world as an aesthetic phenomenon. Camp is the triumph of the epicene style. But all style, that is, artifice is ultimately epicene. Life is not stylish neither is nature”…..

      We should indicate briefly how the various elements are structured in European Art Cinema. The central elements of European film makers marked an awareness of the social reality of the period. All the movements reflected social tension, political vision or aesthetic movement. They created a new aesthetic platform from which sprouted endless possibilities for creating a new language or rhetoric on cinematographic vision. One the most important concepts to have emerged during this time was the concept of the ‘zeitgeist’, expressing the film makers’ parallel creativity.

One of the other cultural elements was that as European film makers and aestheticians established the theory of cinematography they began to be taken seriously as practitioners of an intellectual Art platform in its own right. The first step here was undeniably taken by the Russian film makers of the twenties. The theoretical approach of Russian film makers was used in direct reference to the method of dialectical materialism. Eisenstein was an extraordinary montage theoretician. Later on the existence of Andre Bazin and the other writers of Cahiers Du Cinema were to play great roles in theoretical articles and criticism, analysing structure and narrative, the meaning of mis en scene on cinematography. Mis en scene is the manner in which the director has chosen to express himself.

The other theorician Roland Barthes,”Cinematographic expression also belongs to this order of large scale units of meaning, corresponding to global, diffuse, latent signifieds which are not in the same category as the isolated and discontinuous signifieds of articulated language…..” . The European Art Film-makers elaborated and applied a critical theory of the cinema, a specific methodology , particular definition, semiologic dialectical materialist way .Christian Metz, Andre Bazin, Piere Paolo Pasolini, Umberto Eco, Roland Barthes, C.Levi Strauss and the others.

      European Art film makers were undoubtedly cinephiles between whom collaborations were made of a variety of different positions on film-making. This was vital in terms of the functional roles in film-making. Apparently, they introduced the concept of the Auteur that enabled the writing of scenarios, directing, editing, montage etc. For example, Jean Luc Godard, Francoise Truffaut, Pasolini, Jean Cocteau….

The elements drew attention to the creation of a new art form and seized the moment. Memento Mori reflected a different expression and built sense of the Avant-garde. The early Avant-garde filmmakers and Russian intellectuals showed the way and others followed in their footprints; significantly Cahiers and the New Wave’s Auteurs. The revolutionary Russian Film culture had a deep influence on European Art films, also the role Eisenstein played as a mentor and guiding reference.


Films are a dialectical part of the socio-economic system and also a part of the ideological movement and system. The nature of dialecticism in cinematographic vision is politic. Clearly, the power of cinematographic vision reproduced reality. European Art film came up with a radically different way of film making like replacing the studio sets with real settings. Also, going against the star system by using anonymous players. European film makers made progress in the way they expressed the revolutionary evolution of the language of cinematography. They pushed cinematographic vision to its limits and improved the technical and psychological dimensions. European Art Cinema is a particularly different manner of producing films with more creative freedom for auteur film-makers.

European Art Cinema has meaning where human beings struggle, in social tensions and human conditions. These things are not separated from cinematographic movement. Cinema is a part of life and an art form too. European film-makers are always concerned with political tension.

Is speculation over European Art Cinema still with us or not? European Art Cinema has played a leading role for other directors around the world. Even now, a variety of different aesthetics and visions are copied or imitated from what the European film makers have done before through re-makes or collage works, most notably in Post Modern times. And European Film makers try to be more experimental, creating more Avant-garde forms and they will continue to push the limits and dimension even further and find new way for the future of cinematographic vision.

                                                       2006, London & Cuneyt CERIT

 
 
 
BIBLIOGRAPHY

Bazin, Andre, What is Cinema? vol.I. Foreword by Jean Renoir, (University of California Press, LA, 1967)

Bazin, Andre, What is Cinema? vol.II. Foreword by Francoise Truffaut, (University of California Press, LA, 1971)

Browne, Nick (ed.) Cahiers du Cinema vol.III. 1969-1972: The Politics of Representations, (Routledge, 1990)

Edwards, Gwynne, Almodovar: Labyrinths of Passion (Peter Owen, 2001)

Marcus, Millicent, Italian Film in the Light of Neo-Realism, (Princeton University Press, 1986)

Marie, Michel, The French New Wave, (Blackwell Publishing, Paris, 2003)

Mellen, Joan (ed.).Film guide to The Battle of Algiers (Indian University Press, 1973)

Metz, Christian, Film Language (Oxford University Press, 1974)

Smith, Paul Julian, Desire Unlimited, The Cinema of Pedro Almodovar (Verso, 1994)

Vernon, Kathleen& Barbara Morris, Post-Franco Postmodern: the films of Pedro Almodovar (Greenwood Press, 2000)