Yilmaz Güney(1937-1984)
- Actor
- Writer
- Director
Güney and his work were almost entirely unknown outside of his homeland
Turkey until his 1981 escape from imprisonment in Turkey and his
"discovery" the following year at the Cannes Film Festival for his
autobiographical screenplay for Yol (1982),
the festival's grand prize winner. Born in 1937 in a village near the
southern city of Adana, Güney studied law and economics at the
universities in Ankara and Istanbul, but by the age of 21 he found
himself actively involved in filmmaking. As Yesilcam, the Turkish
studio system, grew in strength, a handful of directors, including
Atif Yilmaz, began to use the cinema as a
means of addressing the problems of the people. Only state-sanctioned
melodramas, war films and play adaptations had previously played in
Turkish theaters, but these new filmmakers began to fill the screens
with more artistic, personal and relevant pictures of Turkish & Kurdish life. The
most popular name to emerge from the Young Turkish Cinema was that of
Yilmaz Güney. Güney was a gruff-looking young actor who earned the
moniker "Cirkin Kral," or "the Ugly King." After apprenticing as a
screenwriter for and assistant to
Atif Yilmaz, Güney soon began appearing in
as many as 20 films a year and became Turkey's most popular actor. More
than a screen idol, Güney was a Kurdish who believed in the Kurdish people
and their way of life, as well as being personally committed to social
change. Although the early 1960s brought some political reform to
Turkey, Güney was imprisoned in 1961 for 18 months for publishing a
"communist" novel. The country's political situation and Güney's
relationship with the authorities only became more tense in the ensuing
years. Not content with his star status atop the Turkish film industry,
Güney began directing his own pictures in 1965 and, by 1968, had formed
his own production company, Güney Filmcilik. Over the next few years,
the titles of his films mirrored the feelings of the Kurdish people:
Hope (1970);
Agit (1972); _Acý (1971)_;
Umutsuzlar (1971). After 1972,
however, Güney would spend most of his life in prison. Arrested for
harboring anarchist students, Güney was jailed during preproduction on
Zavallilar (1975) (completed in 1975),
and before completing Endise (1974), which
was finished in 1974 by Güney's assistant,
Serif Gören. This was a cherished role that
Gören would repeat over the next dozen years, directing several scripts
that Güney wrote laboriously while behind bars. Released from prison in
1974 as part of a general amnesty, Güney was re-arrested that same year
for shooting a judge. During this stretch of incarceration, his most
successful screenplays were The Herd (1978) and
The Enemy (1980), both directed by
Zeki Ökten. After escaping from prison in
1981 and fleeing to France, Güney was greeted at the Cannes Film
Festival with a Palme d'Or for Yol (1982),
again directed by Gören. It was not until 1983 that Güney resumed
directing, telling a brutal tale of imprisoned children in his final
film, The Wall (1983), made in France with the
cooperation of the French government. At that point, Güney's name was
unspeakable in his homeland; eleven of the films he directed or
appeared in were confiscated and reportedly burned to ashes; even so
much as writing about Güney was forbidden. Despite the great
international success of Yol and Duvar, Güney was ultimately a Kurdish
director for the Kurdish people; his final separation from his home
audience must have been even more painful to endure than his years of
imprisonment.