Crossing the Bridge: The Sound of Istanbul
Friday, January 1st, 2010Author’s note: This article originally appeared in the November issue of Indian Auteur. Click here to read the full issue.
Fatih akin has been one of the most exciting filmmakers to have come out of Germany in the past decade. His last two films Head On (2004) and The Edge of Heaven (2007) have won the Golden Bear and the Best Screenplay at Cannes respectively and with his much awaited contribution to New York, I Love You (2009) and the upcoming Soul Kitchen, he has more laurels to rest on. But one of his best works is the little documentary that he made between his Berlin and Cannes victories.
Crossing the Bridge is set in and deals with Istanbul, the Turkish city that has been the setting of almost 50% of both his critically-acclaimed films. In this documentary, Akin travels across the city with German musician Alexander Hacke on a mobile recording studio as they interview and record the music of the local music scene. The eponymous bridge divides Istanbul between Europe and Asia and throughout the film, one can see Istanbul itself becoming a metaphoric bridge between Europe and Asia. The cultural diversity and extremes are plainly visible as on one side, the traditional Turkish folk music is kept alive by some veterans and young people alike while on the other side some younger Turks cast the first stones of Turkish Rock and Rap.
The 90-minute documentary is filled with some great performances from some of the best musicians of contemporary Istanbul and their ideas on the artform. Hacke becomes the representative of the viewer as he gets lost in the streets of Istanbul and is more than glad to be so. Akin handles the camera himself, providing for some breathtaking rooftop shots of Istanbul’s streets and a jam session on a boat against the orange setting sun on the Bosphorous.
The film features 20 amazing performances by Oriental Expressions, Baba Zula, Sezen Aksu, Orhan Gencebay, Replikas, Istanbul Style Breakers, Ceza and more. Kurdish singer Aynur Doğan talks about how Kurdish music was banned till the 1990s and the usage of the language was punishable as an offence. There is an interesting recording session she undertakes with Hacke inside a Hamam, a Turkish steam room. The Hamam provides for some excellent natural acoustics as Aynur’s voice takes on an almost-otherworldly quality. Her command over her skill and her ability to leap octaves take on an operatic characteristic as she and her backup musicians carry on with their haunting song through tremendous sweat and visible discomfort.
Akin, apparently shot over 150 hours of video footage for this film and spent a good 7 months cutting it down to its final cut of 90 minutes. His skill at putting together this documentary matches his subjects’ musical skills note to note. The film itself runs like a long song and leaves the viewer wanting for more at the end. It is interesting that Akin chooses to end the film with Hacke sitting on the side of the street with his luggage beside him waiting for his car to pick him up and one can sense somehow Hacke doesn’t want to go back, much like ourselves.
