Kabahat | by Umran Safter

KABAHAT 1:24:00

Directed and Written by: Umran Safter[1]

Cast : Isil Acaray as Ummu; Mina Demirtas as Reyhan; Ece Demirturk as Shukran; Berivan Edebali as Hatije; Eray Yasin Isik; 
Produced by Suraj Sharma[2]; E: suraj_s_99@yahoo.com Music by Yagiz Oral; Cinematography by Bertan Ozer; Sound: Tuğrul Gültepe;
Composer: Yağiz Oral; Line Producer: Şahin Alparslan; Film Editing by Ömer Leventoglu , Umran Safter.

Melih Soysal focus puller; Seyfettin Yildirim assistant camera; Levent Ozturk colorist.   

Production Companies: Ekim Medya

World Sales: Ekim Medya www.ekimmedya.com

Mavi Boncuk |

See also: (in Turkish) Kabahat (2022) Filminin Yönetmeni Ümran Safter ile Röportaj

13-year-old Reyhan, raised in a religious family, arrives in a conservative Central Anatolian village, to spend her summer holidays, with her mother and brother where her notorious grandmother lives. She has just had her first period and dreads the consequences of being unable to perform the required religious rites. One day after Reyhan arrives at the village, her period ends for the first time and she has to perform ghusl according to religious rules. However, the deterioration of the bathroom in the village and the water cuts due to drought drag Reyhan into a great dilemma and fear.

[1] A recipient of numerous international and national film awards, Ümran Safter is a director, script writer and former journalist.  She embarked on her filmmaking career in 2014 and her debut feature motion picture Guilt debuted in 2022 at the Adana Altin Koza International Film Festival, where it won 3 awards including the Special Jury Prize for Best picture. She has made several feature documentary films exploring multiculturalism and gender issues, including titles such as The Eye of Istanbul, Sevan the Craftsman, The Sin of Being a Woman and Leave the Door Open.

Selected Filmography

2021 Kapıyı Açık Bırak / Leave the Door Open (Documentary)

2019 Kadın Olmanın Günahı / The Sin of Being a Woman (Documentary)

2018 Sevan Bıçakçı / Sevan the Craftsman(Documentary)

[2]  Suraj Sharma: Producer

He is a communicator, documentary film producer and journalist, Suraj Sharma was born in 1976 in Tehran and educated in the UK, Germany and India. He started his professional career as an assistant news producer at the BBC, working in Tehran, Iran.

He then joined Associated Press Television News as a news producer. His work there saw him cover the wars in Afghanistan (2001) and Iraq (2003). He also worked at the New Delhi bureau of the Associated Press. He has also worked in various communication roles for United Nations agencies. Since 2003 he lives in Turkey and in this time has been involved in the production of various documentary films.

SYNOPSIS

Reyhan, who has grown up in a religious family, arrives to spend her summer holidays at her grandmother Ummu’s house in a conservative Central Anatolian village, accompanied by her mother Hatice, 37, and her 7-year-old brother Mehmet.

13-year-old Reyhan arrives at her grandmother’s village in a state of inner turmoil. She has just had her first period and is wracked by fear of the consequences of being unable to perform the required religious rites. On the other hand, she desperately doesn’t want to believe in these fears, which deep down she feels are nothing but superstitions based on conservative traditions.

Her instincts have pushed her not to confide in her mother about having had her period. Reyhan becomes even more distraught when she finds out that the water supply at her grandmother’s village house is cut off. She is desperate to find a way to perform the required religious ablution rites, which she has always been told will protect her from disfiguration and attacks by jinns. Upon her arrival in the village, the gossip among the village women is that Semanur, whom she knows from previous summer-time Kuran classes, has been possessed by jinns and is now disfigured for not performing the requisite ablutions.

With no access to water to perform the ablutions at the house, Reyhan tries to find other ways of performing her ablutions but a prevailing drought and conservative norms leave her unable to do so. She starts having nightmares. The first thing she does every morning is look in the mirror to see if disaster has struck. Her interactions with the 4 women in her life and her experiences this summer challenge her free-spirited nature and the independence she yearns for.

Apart from struggling with her own fears, Reyhan also becomes determined to help Sukran, 17, her best friend in the village. Sukran fears she is pregnant. Her period is delayed. Her fiancée is away doing his military conscription. She can’t cope with the stigma attached to an unmarried woman asking for a pregnancy test kit at the pharmacy. Sukran and Reyhan travel in secret to the nearest town looking to purchase a pregnancy test kit. Reyhan secretly also hopes she can visit the public bath in town while there.

This day-trip to town results in a deep meaningful conversation between the two on life, marriage, family, faith and traditions. It is a summer when Reyhan confronts her mother about what she perceives to be Hatice’s complete submissiveness and acceptance of various injustices. She also takes a more avid interest in learning the story of her aunt, Munevver, who remained unmarried and is ostracized by her family and the entire village. Reyhan also becomes engaged in a battle of wills with Ummu, her grandmother - a domineering matriarch who believes it is the destiny of women to abide by the traditional and conservative norms they are expected to live by. Ummu also has a reputation in the village for being a Hodja - a person well-versed in religion and prayers. This reputation has made Ummu even more conservative in her views.

Director’s statement

The film centers on Reyhan and Sukran, two girls dealing with existential issues whilst growing up in a poor, traditional and conservative village - the residents of which view as taboo the worries and concerns that confront girls during their pubescent and teenage years. The other characters are women who play a crucial role in Reyhan’s life and upbringing. Growing up, I spent most of my summer holidays in a Anatolian village. Like Reyhan, I spent many nights having nightmares because I wasn’t able to perform the required ablutions after having my first period. I wanted to use my directorial debut in fictional feature films to portray the forceful and life-shaping impact of this episode in my life.

I wanted to use the other characters in the film to cast a light on how it is often women who lead when it comes to imposing this unjust stranglehold girls face from an early age.

The film also looks to portray Reyhan and Sukran’s struggle for independence from a suffocating and intimidating atmosphere within the context of regular life in an Anatolian village, where drought, poverty and the interactions between village residents comes to the fore.

Filming Style

The film focuses on the stories and interactions of the 5 women in the film as part of daily life in a central Anatolian village. I used simple, realistic and unexaggerated sequences to portray the emotions, interactions and their impact on the characters. I simultaneously tried to create a strong and fairytale-like atmosphere to better depict these emotions, interactions and circumstances.

The film contains long dynamic sequences to depict the environs and situations that the principal characters find themselves in. The majority of filming was done in natural light. I wrote the script based on the village house and the region where I spent most of my summer holidays growing up. Filming at the same location allowed me to capture the surrounding landscape and conditions, which play a major role in defining the characters of its people. I used the village house as a location without making any changes whatsoever and many villagers as part of the cast.