Entrusted, english version

“Entrusted”

 (Unofficial) Review on the Chagan Irmak`s new film, date of release is 23.03.2018

"…Who is in me, I wonder, calling out their names, there were the Madmen, Butchers, Killers and the hellish Demons…" (С) «Mor ve Otesi»

The Turkish film director Chagan Irmak comes to a number of cinematographers of Turkey, whose works stand out by their special nonstandard way of perceiving and expressing social and humans` problems of surrounded world, variety of which, they tend to represent.

The Irmak`s new film, according to critics, is not out of context of his previous works, where the director traditionally tries to combine genres of mystics and drama. In this, basically, the master`s unique “penmanship” is seen.
 
But in no way, the “Entrusted” film will occupy a special place in the director`s filmography, because in this work putting aside presentment of mystical events, he tries to explore the nature of human`s psychics, setting a chain of causes and effects, which is, in a certain way, influenced on the hero`s destiny and reflected in leitmotif of the film.
 
In my view, the film has succeeded. It traps attention of spectators from the first shot and keeps in curiosity and in tension till the final titles.
 
The director is able to compile two culturologic approaches, of “inner and outer world”, i.e. making the story, which does not have some geographical boundaries, actually, it may take place in any country and society, at the same time, he makes a typically Turkish movie, adding ethnical and cultural details fit these grounds and understandable for the people with a specific mentality. For example, he has chosen as a main action place some remote village with all its ethnical attributes, or he introduces a heroin of a blind healer, who represents rites of local shamanism and etc.
 
So, what is this film about?

A young architect Kerem is very successful person. He has everything, including a beautiful wife, money, career, status and ect. He lives in a luxurious block of flats with a view to the see landscape, he is a winner of this life, and he is lucky man. But… not everything is so perfect as it could be seen. The young pair has problems with childlessness and this fact, from time to time, tests their relationships on solidity.
 
Accidently, Kerem has faced the horrible events, which changed his life radically. He and his wife got into an auto catastrophe. He survived, but lost his sweetheart spouse… Moreover, he became an accidental causer of a little boy`s death, who used to live in those grounds.
 
This scene, actually, is the first notorious accent of the film, after which, the hero crossed over a new stage of his life, cardinally differing from the previous ones.

He survived after the catastrophe, but he has been pressed by a mass of emotional sufferings and shocks. First of all, loss of his beloved one, responsibility for the child`s death. Life stopped shining in its bright colours, instead of feeling a joy of being, his soul is eroded by sense of guilt.

FEELING HIMSELF GUILTY – this is what became his internal burden, his fatality and punishment. It can be said that he voluntarily chose the fate, thinking, he "deserved" it for the people`s death, surrendering himself a whore of sufferings and compunction, which eats him from inside.

Bringing himself to the edge of emotional meltdown, losing connection with reality, Kerem sinks into abyss of his misery and allows his inner fears and demons of his sick soul, to revive and to influence on his life.

So, in this moment, mystics, gloom and unreality come to the life of Kerem. A monster from the other world starts chasing him, whom the hero released refusing bright sides of his own soul. He tries to get better, but it does not work and he decided to travel to a small town named Asos.
 
In a remote village, he meets a blind woman, the local shaman and healer, who wants to help him to overcome his pain. Connected with the parallel worlds, she opens the Kerems` eyes on many details of his life coming from his childhood. Kerem recollects a devilish villain, who was living behind and was hunting little children.
 
He recollects vague pictures of his childhood, he cannot remember precisely bloody events taking place in that time, he just found out that there was a fatal link between him and the villain.

The dead child, who is an accidental victim of Kerem, has opened “a portal of Limb”, setting free the villain-demon, who claims a revenge.

On this point of the story, a genre transformation from psychologic drama with elements of thriller to a classical horror is happened. Actually, the line in between of them is thin, but it exists. 

The monster, fostered in the depths of Kerem`s soul, becomes out of control. The more the fears and sufferings increase, the more the power of the monster straightens. The only way for Kerem is to win his both inner and outer demons.
The second accent and a kind of coda of the film this is a struggle of Kerem with the monster, or more, the struggle of Kerem with himself.
 
A certain symbolism is seen in the fight, which peculiar to the film in whole. Finding strengths, Kerem wins. But a blind woman, who represents a good, gives her life in the name of destroying evil. Indeed, the victory over the monster means not only releasing of Kerem, but also releasing of souls of innocent children, who became victims of the hellish creature, living at one time in the musk of a human being.

Getting rid of his monsters, inhabited before his soul and his reality, Kerem starts feeling a beauty of life again.
 
As it was mentioned above, symbol or metaphor this is the language, chosen by the director for his film. Perhaps, one does not need to perceive the events too literally, learning to read between the lines.

The Metaphor of the plot is, in fact, that we foster ourselves the inner monsters in our souls, letting them intrude our lives, feeding them with our fears, sufferings, anguishes, disappointment with life and disability to see light through the darkness. Our inner dimness is reflected in the world we live, in our micro-world, in our micro-universe, the harmony in which, we try to create during all our life.

Who knows, maybe those terrible events that Kerem used to undergo in his childhood, loss of his best friend, who was caught in a trap, set by the villain, left in the Kerem`s soul feeling of injustice in life. Perhaps, this became an initial point, a nourishing ground for these monsters, being born by Kerem himself, and they, finally, came to independent life? There are lots of interpretations.
 
In any case, the story catches an attention. This film makes one think, makes our minds work dipper. And that`s why I intentionally did not notice some arguable moments that obviously, have a place in it.

In the film some cliche`s, which proper for the genre, are noticeable. The film creators emphasise on its psychologic aspects, but in my opinion, besides psychology, the horror genre instruments are used here much more. Namely, the hero`s hallucinations, ghosts moving like spiders along the walls, creatures from the hell with corresponded makeup, a noise, a music from nowhere and etc.
 
The main factor, which, as I think, defines the film to the horror category, is that the monster from the hell and concomitant elements, are neither consequence of psychic conditions of the hero, nor a result of his sick imaginary. The monster became a real and independent personage, who has his own story, the name, and he represents a concrete evil origin.
   
Surely, the director had been inspired by the famous western films in this genre, where one can see reminiscences and references to “Shutter Island” (Martin Scorsese), “The Orphanage” (H-A.Bayona), “The Shack” (S.Hazeldine), “The lovely bones” (P.Jackson), “Limbo” (N.Vincenzo) and the others.

In my opinion, among arguable moments there is some confusion of the events and the story: a child-killer(?), a child-victim; the monster from the hero`s imaginary, suddenly, transformed to a demon of the villain from the hero`s life story, who came from hell; not always logical compilation of events from Kerem`s childhood with the tragedy he used survive being adult.

In the second, there is a visible willing of the director “to remain sitting on two chairs”, namely, not getting over the genre of classic thriller, he tried to fill emotional content of the film with “digging” in depths of injured subconscious of the hero and, at the same time, to emphasize on painful social problems. If it is a psychologic drama with elements of thriller, then, the main accent should have been made on this aspect. If this is a classical thriller or horror, then, the more special effects should have been applied in order to scare more the audience with blood-freezing scenes.
 
But all these just subjective remarks of a critic... In general, the film makes more positive impression rather than ambiguous one.

However, the final of the story quite clear and optimistic. Having won his inner demons, Kerem refuses a dark side of his soul. That means, he forms the better reality. He forgives himself, killing the monster in himself, he kills an evil outside, because everything is interconnected.

Macro- and micro cosmos of a human being this is a unified system of relations of the intimate and the universal, earthy and divine, real and supernatural. This is Life. And no any events and circumstances, let them be the hardest and tragic, should stop the life, which is a Gift in itself.
 
“Life is everywhere!” – as if sums up the story Kerem`s wife. Looking at him from the other but better world, she hints that Life is not restricted by the frames of earthy existing.

I would like to note participation in the film of Engin Akyurek. This talented and charismatic actor has already got fame, predominantly, out of Turkey, thanks to his bright appearance, strong energetics and quite a special manner of performing.
 
Flowing over edges, expression, full dipping into the character, strongest emotional power, bringing the internal conflict of his heroes to the highest pick of “boiling”, where just several seconds or millimetres separate him from personal breakup, - all these features distinguish performing of Mr Akyurek and differ his style from the other Turkish actors.
 
Knowing this specialty, Engin attentively selects heroes and characters according to his line of acting. In this sense, choosing of the Kerem`s hero is predictable and understandable. The actor used all the palette of his acting talents in depicting of  Kerem`s character, but not exceeding too much with emotional aspect, that fact, no doubt, increases points in his professional level.
 
Yes, his hero is expressive, emotional, mentally sick, but not hysterical. He is not bothering in his mania. He does not irk. Engin has kept the balance between endless personal crisis of the hero and liny string of his adequacy, not swaying the scales to one or another side.

Despite the tragic circumstances in Kerem`s life, the trauma of his soul, the character created by Engin became pretty harmonic and true. With this work the actor showed indisputable professionalism, demonstrated his craft in the best meaning of the word, and, confirmed his place in the pantheon of outstanding young Turkish movie stars.
 
Who knows, either according to the director`s idea or because of impressive performing of Engin, the Kerem`s character became a central figure in the whole film. The rest of personages just turned around his “orbit” (though, it`s worthy to note a strong performing and professionalism of all the team of actors). Exclusion is the character of a blind shaman woman (actress Sezer Sherif), who also became a clue figure in the story. The Kerem`s wife character (actress Khilal Altinbek) reminds more a phantom pain of the hero, as opposed to the shaman woman, who is becoming his saviour and partner.
 
In the projects with participation of Mr. Akyurek the tendency of attracting by his heroes, an attention of majority of viewers is traced just recently. Though, as a prerequisite to this, his earlier and most solid work in the “Bir Bulut olsam” (If I would be a Cloud) series could be considered. In this telenovela, Engin, literally, grabbed all the attention, outshone the rest of personages, that, visibly, was not in the plans of director and screenwriter.
 
However, consciously, such a phenomenon could be traced in his last series “Olene kadar” (To the Death itself, 2017), which, unfortunately, did not have a successful destiny and was closed. But in this project also, Engin succeeded to endow his hero, his uneasy life, with such a strong emotional aspect, taken all the accents to himself, where all the events and heroes turned around him and his tragedy.
 
Hopefully, the Engin`s work in the “Entrusted” film will be particular «landmark» in his career, and, possibly, will influence on his future ambitions and plans.
 
In conclusion, it can be said that the film of Chagan Irmak took its place in the cinematography of Turkey. Surely, it stands out of standards of the Turkish mass media production, it even could be unacceptable by mass audience, but those, who watched it, would remember it for a long time. Films like this, are a kind of “cultural locomotives” that haul, often “with a screak”, experimentation and developing of genres do not peculiar to the local commercial conjuncture. In this specialty, value and benefit of such works of art is seen.

And finally, one can fully agree with the film creators, namely, that every spectator, who estimated their work, would find in the story something consonant, which touchs a part of one`s soul and heart. And let me add from myself that this film, perhaps, will help overcoming our inner demons, who are in a plenty in each of us.
 
Nargis Tash, art-critic, PhD