SaturDox 2019

2 March – 11 May 2019

It is the 10th edition of SaturDox Documentary Screenings, which was initiated as a collaboration of Depo and Documentarist Istanbul Documentary Days in 2010! In 10 years with more than 100 documentary films and many guest speakers, SaturDox has become a part of Istanbul cultural agenda and an ongoing annual program at Depo.

The 10th edition of Which Human Rights? Film Festival, a side event of Documentarist was planned to be organized last December but had to be cancelled due to lack of financial support. This year’s SaturDox program is formed around the theme of “human rights” and a selection made out of those films which could not find the chance to meet the audience. Also it goes without saying that the extraordinary times Turkey is passing through and increased human rights violations imposed such a theme to be adopted.

The stories of people from many countries who struggle for justice and legal rights will be on screen during the program which will start on 2nd March and continue with screenings on every other Saturday until 11th May. The last screening of the 10th SaturDox is assigned to a number of short documentaries from Turkey and directors who continue making such films in today’s pressing conditions.

You are, once again invited to possibly grasp and discuss the world we’re living in through documentaries!

PROGRAM

2 March Saturday

Naila and the Uprising
Director: Julia Bacha
Palestine, USA, 2017, 75’

When a nation-wide uprising breaks out in 1987, a woman in Gaza must make a choice between love, family, and freedom. Undaunted, she embraces all three, joining a clandestine network of women in a movement that forces the world to recognize the Palestinian right to self-determination for the first time. “Naila and the Uprising” chronicles the remarkable journey of Naila Ayesh whose story weaves through the most vibrant, nonviolent mobilization in Palestinian history –- the First Intifada in the late 1980s.

Talk: “Women in Palestinian Struggle for Freedom”: Lamis el-Soradi (Palestinian journalist from Gaza), Sheerin al-Araj (Palestinian activist from Jerusalem)
Moderator: Aynur Şengal (BDS Turkey Volunteer)

16 March Saturday

The Long Season
Director: Leonard Retel Helmrich
The Netherlands, 2017, 115’

Nine million Syrians have left their homeland since the breakout of the war. Most of them have ended up in camps like Madjal Anjar in the Beqaa Valley, just over the border in Lebanon. Some of the camp’s inhabitants rent land to cultivate crops, while others earn a little toiling in the fields of a local farmer who treats them with contempt. The rest of the time they spend waiting for the bus that brings goods and news from Raqqa. In conditions such as these, frustration rapidly turns to conflict, traumatized children become aggressive and women’s freedom of movement is very restricted. Multiaward-winning director Leonard Retel Helmrich uses his hallmark single-shot cinema verité style to probe deep into life in the camp.

30 March Saturday

Stronger Than a Bullet
Director: Maryam Ebrahimi
Sweden, Qatar, France, 2017, 75’

Devoted to the Iranian Revolution, photographer Saeid documented the Iran-Iraq War (1980–1988) from the eye of the event. His dream was to be a martyr, and many of his photos were used to create war propaganda for martyrdom. Today he views himself as being responsible for sending thousands of boys to their graves. A film about war propaganda, manipulation and control.

13 April Saturday

Soft Vengeance
Director: Abby Ginzberg
USA, 2014, 60’

At the height of apartheid, noted South African activist, author and attorney Albie Sachs was driven into exile, yet still faced threats to his life that cost him dearly. Rather than exchange violence for violence, his revenge took on the form of hope: drafting the nation’s new, inclusive constitution. A powerful testament to the search for truth and reconciliation that marked post-apartheid South Africa, Abby Ginzberg’s portrait of Sachs distills the nation’s turbulent history in the story of one man.

27 April Saturday

The Silence of Others
Director: Robert Bahar, Almudena Carracedo
Spain, 2018, 96’

The story of the urgent and ongoing struggle of victims of Spain’s 40-year dictatorship under General Franco, who continue to seek justice to this day. Filmed over six years, the film follows victims and survivors as they organize the groundbreaking “Argentine Lawsuit” and fight a state-imposed amnesia of crimes against humanity, in a country still divided four decades into democracy. Executive Produced by Pedro Almodóvar, the documentary has won several awards including Berlinale Panorama Audience Award, Berlinale Peace Prize and Sheffield Grand Jury Award.

11 May Saturday
Short Documentaries from Turkey

Doctor
Director: Yavuz Üçer
Turkey, 2018, 10’

Turkoman Beşir and his family forced to flee to Turkey from Syria because their village was bombed in the civil war in Syria. Beşir’s dream before the war was being a doctor and helping people, but now he is not even able to answer to the question “What’s your dream?”

Somewhere in the Mountains
Director: Ferda Yılmazoğlu, Pınar Pamuk
Turkey, 2014, 16′

The film focuses on two stories among those of thousands of people who were forcibly disappeared in the post-1990 period, and positions the landscape it records as a space of remembrance and struggle.

Where You Left Off
Director: Volkan Güney Eker
Turkey, 2017, 18’

Having lost his father in detention in 1995 while she was only 12 years old, Besna Tosun meets Saturday Mothers in hope of finding his father and continues to fight for justice and freedom with them for over 20 years.

Among the Ruins
Director: Özcan Alper
Turkey, 2018, 12’

A young poet named Lal (32) spends his endless days alone with his thoughts inside his small prison cell. A sparrow, not certain if its real or if its a product of his imagination, suddenly appears inside his cell. This sparrow flying frantically while looking for an escape, pushes Lal to go on a personal journey caught in between reality and dream. As the poet returns to the streets of the city of his childhood, he will find time frozen, his memories destroyed and his people scattered.

Roundtable: “On documentary production in Turkey” with the participation of the directors.