Review of Once Upon a Time in Anatolia (2011) by Ben D — 10 Dec 2012

The cinema of Nuri Bilge Ceylon has often wowed international art house crowds. From the spare, controlled atmosphere of Uzak, to the relationship drama Climates, cut like a horror movie. This, his seventh movie, sees him again proving that he is one of the most brilliant of directors working in contemporary cinema, an artist of unique vision.

It is a mistake to judge this film by its title - Once Upon a Time in Anatolia - and infer some deference to previous films with similar titles: whereas OUATI...The West and America, Sergio Leone's two operatic elegies to lost terrain, were about regretting the loss of the past, the title as used here takes us back to fairy-tale, and to innocence. There was a time, as a child, when all the good stories began Once Upon a Time... and the lesson learned by the doctor in this film that sometimes it is best to stay with the fairy-tale version of events, and not know the truth. It is why he lies in the autopsy. Knowing the truth would hurt the widow more than allowing her to believe the fallacy.

As in all his works, the cinematography here is first-rate: even in the simplest of shots there is something beautiful to look at. It is a style much imitated, but never equalled. Whereas the imitators film beautifully, they forget that behind the images there must be a story, some meat for us to devour. So here we have three vehicles, driving through the countryside at night: they are filled with police, a prosecutor, and two men, accused of murder. They are going to find a body, dumped in this wilderness. A lesser film would have focussed on the crime, the motivation for it, but not here: the focus is the relationship between the doctor and the prosecutor, the interactions of these men going about their daily business. A western - and by that I mean Hollywood - film would have highlighted the grisly details, and dealt with the messy business rather more hurriedly than Ceylon allows it. In this gruesome task, he finds the blackest of humour. Even on dangerous ground, men find the unlikeliest of friends.

Once Upon a Time in Anatolia is a mature, beautiful piece of contemporary cinema, dazzling in its intellectual qualities, profound in its human qualities. It is spare, elegiac and yet full of depth. Unexpected and powerful, it is deserving of all the plaudits it has won, and then some.