Berlinale 2018 | Akin and Alper in Competition

Mavi Boncuk |

PRESS RELEASES 69TH BERLINALE

DEC 13, 2018:
BERLINALE 2019: FRANÇOIS OZON, MARIE KREUTZER, DENIS CÔTÉ, FATIH AKIN, ANGELA SCHANELEC, AND EMIN ALPER IN THE COMPETITION / HEINRICH BRELOER, ZOYA AKHTAR AND CHARLES FERGUSON IN THE BERLINALE SPECIAL

Der Goldene Handschuh (The Golden Glove)World premiere
Germany / France by Fatih Akin (Head On, In the Fade)
Cast: Jonas Dassler: Fritz Honka; Uwe Rohde: Herbert Nürnberg; Dirk Böhling: Soldaten-Nobert; Lars Nagel: Nasen-Ernie; Jessica Kosmalla: Ruth; Philipp Baltus


With a dark horror thriller around a serial killer in Hamburg in the 1970s, Fatih Akin is represented in the competition of the Berlinale. 

"The Golden Glove" is about the true story of Fritz Honka, who murdered four women between 1970 and 1975. The film adaptation of the eponymous bestseller by Heinz Strunk tells the story of the Hamburg women's murderer Fritz Honka. Jonas Dassler ("The Silent Classroom") plays the role Honka, who met his victims in the St. Pauli pub "The Golden Glove" and kept the body parts in his attic apartment in Hamburg-Altona. 

It's Akin's first film since his award-winning drama "Out of Nowhere," which won the Cannes Palm Award for Best Actress (Diane Kruger) and Hollywood Golden Globe. 

"The Golden Glove" is produced by bombero international in co-production with Warner Bros. Film Productions Germany and Pathé. The movie is scheduled for release in cinemas in 2019. 

In 2004, Fatih Akin won the Golden Bear, "Against the Wall", the festival's main prize. 

Kız Kardeşler (A Tale of Three Sisters) World premiere
Turkey / Germany / Netherlands / Greece 2019 | DCP | 1:1,85 | 5.1. Mix | 108 Min

Written and Directed by: Emin Alper [1](Beyond the Hill, Frenzy); Cinematography: Emre Erkmen; Edited by: Çiçek Kahraman; Music Composed by: Nikos Papaioannou. Cast:  Cemre Ebüzziya, Ece Yüksel, Helin Kandemir, Kayhan Açikgöz, Müfit Kayacan, Kubilay Tunçer. Produced by: Nadir Öperli (Liman Film) Muzaffer Yildirim (Nu Look) World Sales: The Match Factory (http://www.the-match-factory.de)   

The film tells a unique story of three sisters of different ages, Reyhan, Nurhan, and Havva were sent to town as ‘besleme’ (foster children). Since they fail their foster parents for different reasons, they were sent back in their father's house after many years. Deprived of their dreams of a better life, they try to hold on to each other, revealing the practice of sending poor girls to work as servants for rich families. 

It is a  strikingly beautiful representation on how people from a lower class are trapped in their social status. The story is socially relevant as the growing gap between rich and poor people all over Europe. 

Alper’s previous films include “Beyond the Hill,” which played in Berlin’s Forum section, and “Frenzy,” which won the special jury prize at Venice. 

SYNOPSIS: A TALE OF THREE SISTERS is the story of three sisters from a poor village in Central Anatolia. The girls are given to affluentfamilies as foster children in the hope of improving their lives. The middle sister, Nurhan (16), is handedover to the town’s doctor, Necati Bey (45). However, the older son, Özgur, still wets his bed every night andNurhan has to wash his linen by hand every morning. Tired and angry with Özgur, she occasionally beatshim. Once Özgur’s parents find out about the beating, they send Nurhan back to the village. The youngestof the sisters, Havva (13) lives at Turan Bey’s (40) house and looks after their youngest child, Metin, withall the love and affection she can muster. Metin is suffering from a deadly disease. Metin dies and, inspite of all her efforts to curry favour, Havva is sent back to the village. The oldest of the sisters, Gulsah(20), had been given to Necati Bey many years ago but was sent back to the village because she had becomepregnant as a result of her so-called relationship with a pharmacy apprentice. When Gulsah returnshome, her father Emin (50) hastily marries her off to the poor village shepherd Veysel (30). Not happywith the obligation of fathering Gulsah’s ‘’illegitimate baby’’ Gökhan, Veysel looks forward to having ababy.

Following Nurhan and Havva’s return, after many years the sisters are reunited. In one long night, the three sisters sit together and talk about their past experiences. Sometimes they chat with love andaffection, but sometimes they harshly quarrel since they all want to go back to town, in competition witheach other. On the same night, outside the village, Veysel, Emin and Necati are sitting around a fire at along dinner table. The conversation goes on in an uneasy mood. Following a tense argument among men, Necati kicks Veysel. Veysel goes back home, out of rage and humiliation, spills the hot water from a boilingkettle over Gökhan. As Gökhan dies, Veysel vanishes into thin air.

A few months pass. Everything is buried under the snow. Havva waits for Necati to take her to the town since he decides to take her as the new fosterchild (instead of Nurhan). Nurhan’s illness, which manifested itself a few months earlier, has progressed.Nurhan also waits for Necati to come to the village and examine her, thinking he owes this to her. Gulsahis pregnant, and before going to the city to live with her aunt, she wants to abort Veysel’s baby. The threesisters wait for the roads to become passable. On a cold winter day, Emin and his daughters wait for Necati, tense but hopeful, chatting beside the fire.

[1] Emin Alper (born 1974 in Karaman, Turkey) is a Turkish filmmaker[1] and historian. His directorial debut, Beyond the Hill won the Caligari Film Prize in the 62nd Berlinale[2] and Best Film at the Asia Pacific Screen Awards.[3] His second feature Frenzy won the Special Jury Prize after premiering in competition at the 72nd Venice International Film Festival.

During his university years, Emin Alper was an active member of the cinema club, spending most of his time with friends thinking on and discussing about cinema. They would organize seminars with the prominent filmmakers of their time, Nuri Bilge Ceylan and Zeki Demirkubuz. He began writing scripts and film reviews. Together with his friends, he published the film magazine “Görüntü.” It was during his university years that his lifelong love for cinema shaped, persuading him to pursue filmmaking as a career.

After graduating from Bogazici University with a degree in Economics, Alper furthered his Academic work, receiving his PhD in Modern Turkish History. Emin Alper subsequently began teaching at the Department of Social Science at Istanbul Technical University. He wrote on cinema and politics at several magazines including Tarih ve Toplum, Birikim, Mesele and Altyazı.

Gaining experience from watching other filmmakers and taking role in their short films, Emin Alper went on to make his first independent short films, The Letter in 2005, and Rıfat in 2006; the latter won Best Short Film at the Bucharest International Film Festival (2008) and the Special Audience Award at the !F Istanbul International Film Festival.

His breakthrough came in 2012, with his directorial debut, ''Beyond the Hill, “about the repressed violence and projections of a Turkish family on holiday."

Following his first feature, Alper made his second feature, Frenzy (2014), a psycho-social drama/thriller about a society“ brought to heel by its fear of terrorism” in which two brothers — one a paroled convict secretly recruited to ferret out terrorists by examining the contents of trash bins, the other hired to kill stray dogs — are sucked into a whirl of state-sponsored distrust. Frenzy was profoundly timely in its subject matter, loudly echoing the current turmoil of politics in Turkey and the Middle East. Alper says of Frenzy, ‘It shows how the political system turns “little men” into the cogs of its violent mechanism by providing them with authority and the instruments of violence, which in the end turn against them and lead to their destruction.’


Premiering in competition at the 72nd Venice International Film Festival, Frenzy was awarded the Special Jury Prize. The film won the Jury Grand Prize at the 9th Asia Pacific Screen Awards. Both Beyond the Hill and Frenzy were chosen as the Best Turkish Film by the Turkish Critics' Association in 2012 and 2015.