Director Nuri Bilge Ceylan is one of the most distinguished
filmmakers alive and The Wild Pear Tree
is arguably one of his best works to date, currently on show at the Denver Film
Festival after its premiere at Cannes in the competition section earlier this
year. If the viewer is patient to absorb a 3-hour film with lots of loaded conversations
and meaningful visuals, the hours spent would be well compensated. More so, if the viewer is well read and
perceptive. It is a film that encompasses social, political and theological
thoughts without being too obvious. Remarks made in passing are not easy to
ignore in any Ceylan film, less so in this one.
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| Sinan, the graduate, reads at home rather than look for work |
On a very simplistic level, a young man Sinan returns home
after graduating in a distant college to his home town after some years. He realizes his school-teacher father Idris
has slid into a compulsive gambler, accumulating debts. His mother Asuman keeps
the home running with a combination of tact, practicality and help from her
neighbours. Asuman wants Sinan to earn a
living now that he has graduated. Sinan slowly distances himself from his
parents. Sinan, who has neither a definite career goal nor a life partner in
mind, wishes to first publish his book that he describes as “quirky,
auto-fiction, meta-novel, free of faith, ideology or agendas.” As an unknown author without any money to
spare, he has to find financial support to get it printed. The
title of the film The Wild Pear Tree is
the title of the book Sinan wants to publish and he does get published
eventually. As the film progresses the symbolic
importance of trees is underlined at crucial places within the film visually by
the Ceylan’s constant trusted cinematographer GokhanTiryaki. A wild pear tree growing in isolation, bears fruits, just as Sinan has earned a graduate degree. It is still a gnarled tree unlike popular pear trees, just as Sinan struggles for fuller acceptance within his family and community.
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| Sinan finally understands his father Idris, who he acknowledges never beat him |
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| Sinan gives a copy of his book to his mother Asuman, acknowledging her role in his life |
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| Sinan with his girlfriend minus her head scarf and her tresses blowing behind a tree |
Those who have been exposed to Ceylan’s previous works will
spot the common structures of Ceylan’s tales: the father, mother, and son trio
in The Three Monkeys (2008); the several
husbands and wives recalled by male characters in Once Upon a Time in Anatolia (2011) including an unforgettable comment in that film, “You
don’t know how boys suffer here, without a father. It’s the kids who suffer
most in the end, doctor, it’s the kids who pay for the sins of adults..”; and the see-sawing relationship of a husband and wife in Winter Sleep (2014) overtly caring and respectful to each
other, taking great care not to tread on each other’s toes. All the films are based on original scripts written by Ceylan
and his wife Ebru Ceylan, sometimes working with a third co-scriptwriter; in
the case of The Wild Pear Tree it is
Akin Aksu, who additionally acts as one
of the two debating Imams in the film. (When this critic had asked director Ceylan
on his wife’s contribution to his films, soon after the release of Winter Sleep in a film festival “question
and answer” session, Ceylan indicated that he was doubtful if his wife would
work on his next film as she felt Winter
Sleep was way too lengthy. Evidently, as in the case of all the wives in
Ceylan’s films, luckily for us, she has continued to work with her husband in
this equally long film: The Wild Pear
Tree).
The Wild Pear Tree
is structured around Sinan’s one-to-one interactions with several men (the
town’s mayor, a wealthy sand merchant, a local author of repute, a former
classmate, two Imams, and his father
Idris) and two women (his mother and his
girl friend). The town’s mayor, in his encounter with Sinan, emphasizes that
his office is open and has no door and yet his actions seem to be contrary to
his speech (an indirect comment on Turkish administrators). In the interaction
with the sand merchant, the businessman acknowledges that he has indeed supported
cultural causes, if it helps him in indirectly in his business. Conversations
reveal a lot. Jobs for graduates are not easy to come by, “Education is great, but this is Turkey” . The film includes a conversation
between Sinan and his former classmate who had no option but chose a career in
the police, where he has to brutally beat up a friend who is rounded up as a
protestor.
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| Scene of despondency in Ceylan's The Wild Pear Tree |
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| Similar scene in Ceylan's earlier work The Three Monkeys |
But Sinan does publish his book and present copies to his
parents. But the film is not about this accomplishment—it is only a turning
point to the bigger story of the film: Sinan’s gradual appreciation of his
parents and their love towards him.
The high point of the film is Sinan’s accidental interaction
with two Imams (Islamic priests). Sinan
encounters the worthies stealing apples from a tree that does not belong to
them and cheekily throws stones at them without revealing his presence to see
their reaction. The tree here is not a
pear tree, but the roles of trees in the film are not merely decorative. While
you wonder about the possible connection to the tree in the Garden of Eden, the
conversation between the Imams and Sinan (who has by now revealed himself) move
on to free will in Islamic theology. In negation of the free will concept, most
conservative Muslims constantly use the phrase ”Insah Allah” (if Allah wills)
just as conservative Jews and Christians say “if it be Thy will” or Hindus refer
to the role of “Karma” and “Atma.” The long conversation as the trio walks
towards the town after picking of the apples can be heard clearly without interruption
and the same sound level while the camera of Tiryaki captures the entire walk from
varied distances and perspectives. Often the dense script of The Wild Pear Tree can be linked to
works of the Turkish Sufi mystic Yusuf Emre and Russian literary masters Chekov
and Dostoevsky. Director Ceylan is
considerably influenced by Chekov, as per his own admission to this critic,
during a public question and answer session.
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| Has Sinan's father committed suicide? |
There are three occasions when trees make their presence
felt in The Wild Pear Tree: once
when the Imams pluck the apples that do not belong to them; once when Sinan
sees his father had fallen under a tree with a cut rope dangling from it, a perfect
suicide scenario; and once when Sinan kisses his girlfriend using the tree
trunk for privacy. And all of them are important structural points in the film.
Ceylan, his wife Ebru and cinematographer Tiryaki are a constant talented team who add on other members as key crew members in each film. In The Wild Pear Tree, Ceylan uses a short segment of the 14 minute Bach’s
Passacaglia and Fugue in C minor
repeatedly with very good effect--a work with religious implications that has
been used by Coppola in The Godfather
in the baptism sequence and even by Jimi Hendrix in Lift Off.
Without a doubt, The
Wild Pear Tree is one of the most important films of 2018, it also happens to be Turkey’s
submission for the Oscars. The only caveat: it requires from the viewer considerable patience and attention to savor the tasteful details.
P.S. Detailed reviews
of three earlier works of Ceylan: The Three Monkeys (2008), Once Upon a Time in Anatolia (2011) and
Winter Sleep (2014) appear on this
blog. (Click on the names of the film in the post script to read those reviews). The Wild Pear Tree is one of the author's top 10 films of 2018.
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