Postcard from the International Crime And Punishment Festival

Golden Scale feature winner My Stolen Planet

Split in two by the Bosphorus, with half the city lying in Europe and the other half in Asia, Istanbul in Turkey is a cultural melting point. The perfect setting then for the International Crime And Punishment Film Festival, which brings the global cinema community together with an academic platform to think about and discuss issues of justice.

This year’s 13th edition of the festival, founded by Prof Dr. Adem Sözüer - who continues to be its president - and run under the watchful eye of director Prof Dr. Bengi Semerci and programme director Alin Taşçıyan, took place from November 22 to 28. I was honoured to attend as part of the Golden Scale Short Film Competition jury, with the festival also awarding a Golden Scale for Best Feature.

Golden Scale short film winner Amarela

The European side of the city screened films in the plush Cinewam and artsy and modern Beyoğlu cinemas, while audiences on the Asian side of the Bosphorus were invited into the beautiful Kadıköy cinema, with its ribbed walls that give a sensation that it has been carved out from rock.

The International Day calling for the Elimination of Violence against Women occurred during the festival - with UN agencies noting that globally 140 women and girls on average were killed by an intimate partner or family member every day last year. Many of the demonstrators were protesting President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s decision to withdraw Turkey from a landmark European Treaty - the Istanbul Convention - in 2021, which aims to protect women from violence.

Police barricaded streets and shut metro stations to prevent protestors from gathering - which had the unfortunate knock-on effect of disrupting cinema attendance as well that evening, although some protesters came on from the demo to the cinema.

Kadıköy Cinema Photo: Amber Wilkinson

Women’s issues were at the heart of several films at the festival, including the Golden Scale feature winner My Stolen Planet - selected by a jury including critic Deborah Young, . The essay documentary, from Farahnaz Sharifi, sees her contemplate the rebellions against the Iranian regime that happen behind closed doors, with a particular focus on the mandatory wearing of the hijab. The director considers the shifting politics spanning her lifetime and everyday acts of resistance, including her own film.

The Golden Scale for short film - selected by me and fellow judges filmmakers Ala’ Abou Ghoush Bucru Aykar - also went to a female-centric entry. André Hayato Saito’s Amarela tracks the injustices - both at home and in the wider world - suffered by Japanese-Brazilian Erika (Melissa Uehara) against the backdrop of the 1998 World Cup final between Brazil and France.

Other notable winners included Ghost Trail, a tense and slippery thriller focusing on a group of exiled Syrians hunting war criminals. Featuring a knock-out performance by Adam Bessa in the central role, Jonathan Millet’s film, which is based on real events, took home the Turkish Film Critics and Student Jury awards.

Cat's the way to do it in Istanbul Photo: Amber Wilkinson

Kurdish entry, When The Walnut Leaves Turn Yellow, directed by Mehmet Ali Konar, won the Audience Award and received a Special Mention from the main jury. The Story Of Souleymane, which tracks the difficulties faced by an asylum seeking bike delivery guy in France, won a Jury Prize.

The features competition, in general, offered a strong line-up of international films on diverse subjects involving justice and human rights, including Lotfi Achour’s Red Path, about the devastating impact of terrorism and trauma in Tunisia and Sandhya Suri’s gripping thriller about the impact of caste on justice in Indian, Santosh.

The short film competition proved to be equally diverse in terms of subject matter. LGBTQ+ themes were impressively explored in Hi Mom, It’s Me, Lou Lou, directed by Atakan Yılmaz, and Elnaz Ghaderpour, Reza Gamini’s Abraham, while Exit Through The Cuckoo’s Nest showed experimental flare to explore the Balkan War, while Cansu Baydar’s drama Almost Certainly False offered an insight into life a Syrian refugee and her younger brother in Turkey.

The festival also screened a number of classic films, including the opening film Orson Welles’ The Trial, plus a collection of shorts under the banner Solidarity With Palestine. Running alongside the cinema screenings was a detailed academic programme in collaboration with Istanbul Bilgi University, featuring a number of panels, including subjects as diverse as early access to lawyers and the right to a fair trial to disciplinary proceedings in football.

The festival proved a vibrant forum for discussion, with lively Q&A sessions and well attended cinemas, rounded out by an awards ceremony, which in true Istanbul fashion, even included a stage management cat. While a festival like this reminds you of the wide-ranging injustices experienced by so many in the world, it's also heartening to see communities come together to talk seriously and deeply about many of the issues represented in a bid to make change where possible under the motto "Justice For All".