BOFA ONLINE
15 April-31 May

Cannes Film Festival, Palme d ‘Or nominee, 2018

Sinan, a young graduate, is desperate to become a writer. He returns to the Turkish village where he grew up hoping to publish his first novel, but although home looks wonderful when he is away from it, being there reminds him of its irritations, not least his father’s debts. Added stress comes from the knowledge that he can’t afford to despise the locals because his literary debut is to be a memoir about the local landscape, entitled The Wild Pear Tree. In fact, his father says the local people are like wild pears: “Misfits, solitary, misshapen.” Director Ceylan draws you into the beauty of the rural landscape with wide shots of rolling hills in sun-dappled light. And slowly but inexorably the excellent cast and intriguing story immerses you in Sinan’s family woes, the countryside and the deeply Turkish concerns about art, politics and the social divide between cities and rural towns.