{"id":6942,"date":"2010-02-09T10:20:44","date_gmt":"2010-02-09T18:20:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/?p=6942"},"modified":"2010-02-09T10:23:06","modified_gmt":"2010-02-09T18:23:06","slug":"kelin-ermek-tursunov-2009-kazakhstan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/?p=6942","title":{"rendered":"Kelin (Ermek Tursunov, 2009): Kazakhstan"},"content":{"rendered":"

Reviewed by Nicholas Berquist<\/a>. \u00a0Viewed at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

When a film can elicit an entire range of emotions from an audience, more often than not it is the sign of a good film.\u00a0 When a film does this without the use of dialogue, someone should be prepared to hand out some accolades.\u00a0 Ermek Tursunov does the unthinkable in his directorial debut, Kelin<\/a><\/em>.\u00a0 He sacrifices the dialogue for compelling images will pique your interest for the entire 82-minute duration.<\/p>\n

Tursunov, being both writer and director, tells the tale of a young village woman torn between two suitors.\u00a0 Taking place in 2nd<\/sup> century Kazakhstan, Kelin\u2019s future is in the hands of her father who will give here to the man with the most wealth regardless of her personal feelings.\u00a0 This decision then perpetuates the inciting incident as Kelin\u2019s true lover (the lesser of the suitors) makes a blood oath to return and take Kelin as his wife.\u00a0 With no other witnesses, Kelin does her best to keep the evidence of the oath hidden as it has left a scar on her forearm.\u00a0 She leaves her father to begin her new life.\u00a0 Her husband is a family man, supporting his brother and shamanistic mother and Kelin soon develops feelings for him.\u00a0 She longs for her true lover but must find a way to live in peace or else pay the price of betrayal.<\/p>\n

While the story may seem a bit typical, keep in mind it is a directorial debut.\u00a0 But what makes this film special is the absence of dialogue.\u00a0 This film is a perfect example of showing, not telling.\u00a0 Rather than relying on speaking, Tursunov lets the camera, landscape, and lighting to reinforce the actions of the characters.\u00a0 For instance, Tursunov utilizes a crane to encompass the majestic landscape of the Altai Mountains.\u00a0 We immediately get a sense for the bleak, lonely world these people live in.\u00a0 There wont be any police or any form of help for that matter.\u00a0 These people are truly on their own living by their own laws.<\/p>\n

The feministic nature of the film is also a breath of fresh air.\u00a0 One would typically think that in nomadic tribes the men would be the center of the family.\u00a0 While on the surface this may be true as we see the men collecting firewood, milking the yaks, and hunting.\u00a0 When Kelin\u2019s husband suffers a fatal wound the feministic theme begins to take over.\u00a0 Without women there cannot be new life, and without the shaman women the death rituals will not be completed.\u00a0 Therefore, Tursunov is opening our eyes to an idea that perhaps wasn\u2019t thought of before.<\/p>\n

Even without speaking this film has the ability to keep you interested.\u00a0 There are fighting scenes, funny scenes, and even tragic scenes.\u00a0 Perhaps one flaw is the characters do have a tendency to seem distant without the use of language, but this is helped by the lighting and musical score.\u00a0 Tursunov also keeps a strong sense of reality through the editing.\u00a0 There are no tacky wipes, fades, or dissolves.\u00a0 Instead he uses the wildlife in the landscape to symbolize passages of time.\u00a0 This film will likely not satisfy everyone, but if I may, I implore you to seize the moment and watch this film.\u00a0 Who knows, maybe this is a once in a lifetime opportunity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reviewed by Nicholas Berquist. \u00a0Viewed at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival. When a film can elicit an entire range of emotions from an audience, more often than not it is the sign of a good film.\u00a0 When a film does this without the use of dialogue, someone should be prepared to hand out some […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":794,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,131],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6942","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-films","category-santa-barbara-film-festival-2010"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6942","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/794"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6942"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6942\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6942"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6942"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6942"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}