Izmir Mediterranean Cinema Meeting (MED CINE İZMİR) starts on November 8. Within the scope of the festival, films from 20 Mediterranean countries will meet the audience. The screenings to be held at Izmir Art, Izmir French Cultural Center, Izmir Architecture Center and Ahmed Adnan Saygun Art Center will be open to the public.
Izmir Mediterranean Cinema Meeting (MED CINE IZMIR) meets with the cinema lovers of Izmir for the third time. Within the scope of the festival, films from 20 Mediterranean countries will meet the audience. The festival events, which will be held in cooperation with Izmir Metropolitan Municipality, Institut français, Chamber of Architects Izmir Branch and Intercultural Art Association, will be held between 8-13 November 2023 at Izmir Art, Izmir French Cultural Center, Izmir Architecture Center and Ahmed Adnan Saygun Art Center. The screenings will be open to the public.
“Art is inherently peaceful.”
The festival started with Izmir Metropolitan Municipality Mayor Tunç Soyer's statement, "Our world does not want war, it wants peace and tolerance." Art is inherently peaceful. It allows us to see life through someone else's eyes. The Mediterranean Cinemas Meeting has a historical mission. It includes all Mediterranean cultures, based on the words "to be an advocate of peace at all times and under all circumstances".
Since November 8, the opening day of the festival, is "World Urbanization Day", a panel titled "City and Art" will be held at Izmir Architecture Center. Chamber of Architects Izmir Branch President İlker Kahraman, Chamber of Urban Planners Izmir Branch Board Member Ceylan Ekin Işık, architect-writer-illustrator Behiç Ak and Gökmen Ulu, director of the movie "Communist Osman", which will be screened after the panel, will attend the panel moderated by Festival Director Vecdi Sayar. The film focuses on the life of Osman Özgüven, the legendary president of Dikili.
reward for Gavras
The only award of the festival, the "Henri Langlois MEDCINE Izmir" Award, will this year go to Costa-Gavras, a French director of Greek origin, one of the masters of the cinema world and the president of the French Cinematheque. Gavras' four feature films (Immortal, Martial Law, Paradise in the West, Adults in the Room) and short films, as well as two collective productions in which he participated, will be screened. An exhibition consisting of photographs of Henri Langlois, Costa-Gavras and Turkish Cinema director Onat Kutlar and posters of the films to be shown at the festival will be held at Izmir Sanat.
On the last day of the festival, on November 13, the "Henri Langlois and the Memory of Cinema Symposium" will be held in İzmir Sanat in memory of Langlois. Among the documentaries to be screened at the festival are "Days of Love, Fire and Anarchy - Onat Kutlar and Turkish Cinematheque", "The Course of the Shadow - Controversial Firsts of Turkish Cinema", "Sounds of the Sky", "Lumiere and His Friends", in which 40 master directors of the cinema world participated with their short films, 13 "Henri Langlois Through the Eyes of the Director", in which the master participated, and "Sadıkbey", a documentary about Izmir.
Two feature films from our cinema
The program also includes two feature-length productions from our cinema. Umut Subaşı's "As if Everything is a Little Disaster", which won the Best Film, Best Director and Best Screenplay awards at the Adana Film Festival this year, and Fikret Reyhan's "Glass", which won the Special Jury Prize and actor awards in Istanbul and Adana Curtain” films will also meet the people of Izmir.
There are 36 movies
In the festival program, in addition to the "Costa-Gavras" and "Homage to Langlois" sections, there are also films in memory of Jean-Luc Godard and Carlos Saura, who passed away recently, and "Cities, Identities", "Mediterranean Women", "Mediterranean Cuisine" and "Mediterranean Cuisine". There are 36 films in the "Masters of the Mediterranean" sections.
Masterpieces to be watched
During the 6-day festival, productions from a total of 32 countries will be able to be watched, as 12 co-producing countries take part in the films of 20 Mediterranean countries. When the directors who took part in the collective films made on Lumiere and Langlois are included, the works of a total of 86 directors will meet the Izmir audience.
Among the films in the program, there are also films nominated for the 2023 Oscars: France's candidate "Chefs' Love", Tunisia's candidate "Four Sisters", Slovenia's candidate "Drivers", Jordan's candidate "Hopefully It Will Be a Boy" .
In addition to these, "Kidnapped", "Dogs", "Nezouh", which were shown at the 2023 and 2022 Cannes and Venice festivals, "Mother Valley", which was selected as the Best Arab film at the Cairo Festival, "Medium", which received the 'Cineuropa award in Sarajevo, Locarno “A Safe Place”, which was awarded in 2018, “Carmen”, which was nominated for an Oscar from Maltese cinema last year, “Lament”, representing Montenegro Cinema on international platforms, with twin Portuguese actors in the lead roles, “The Game” by Jacques Tati, one of the masters of French cinema. "It's Time" and the fantastic animation "The King and the Bird" by Paul Grimault, the famous creator of animation cinema, for children and adults can be watched.
Mediterranean Songs
As part of the Izmir Mediterranean Cinemas Meeting, the "Mediterranean Songs" concert of Savinna Yannatou and Thessaloniki Trio will take place at the Ahmed Adnan Saygun Art Center on the evening of November 11. The program includes songs from Greece, Turkey, Italy (Sardinia), Spain, Albania and France (Corsica), as well as songs in Arabic, Armenian and Ladino languages. Participation in the concert is free. For detailed information www.kultursanat.izmir.bel.tr It can be reached from the website and from the accounts of medcineizmir on Instagram and (x) and Medcineİzmir on Facebook.