Filmmor Festival on Wheels hits the road

ISTANBUL

Screening only female filmmakers’ films, the 12th Filmmor festival will screen six films by Catherine Breillat. ‘Sleeping Beauty’ is one of her films.

The independent International Filmmor Women’s Film Festival on Wheels, organized by women for women, will be held between March 15 and 23. Demanding a job, income and budget for every woman, the festival will screen 60 films in four cities.

The festival will start in Istanbul with screenings at the Institut Français, Istanbul Modern and Pera Museum. It will meet audiences in the southern provinces of Mersin on April 5-6 and Adana on April 12-13 before heading to the southwest and Bodrum on April 19 and 20.

Screening only female filmmakers’ films, Filmmor will present 33 films made during the last year in the Women’s Cinema category.

The festival will commemorate Bilge Olgaç, the female director who directed the largest number of films in Turkey’s cinematic history, with three of her films: “Açlık” (Hunger), “İpekçe” (Silky) and “Kaşık Düşmanı” (The Spoon Haters).

In the “A Daring Woman: Catherine Breillat” tribute, there will be six Catherine Breillat films including “Anatomy of Hell,” “Blue Beard,” “The Last Mistress,” “Romance X,” “Sleeping Beauty” and “Abuse of Weakness.”

In another section of the festival, the “Our Body is Ours” category, women will once again raise their voice on their bodies with films such as “17 Girls,” “How to Lose Your Virginity,” “I’m Rahmen” and others.

In the category “A Purse of Her Own,” which is also the theme of the festival this year, there will be seven films about the struggle for women’s labor. The five films in the Sex-ual-ity category will ask questions on gender and sexuality, forcing one to think beyond the ordinary.

Out of the 60 films in the festival, 18 are from Turkey. There are 14 documentaries, seven animation films, 24 long and 15 short feature films in the program. There also will be three premieres for the films “Honey,” “The Sofa” and “Dolls Don’t Cry.”

Other festival activities

The solidarity award, the Purple Camera Award for a Promising Female Filmmaker, will be given to one of the directors of the films that represent women in a non-passive, non-traditional and non-sexist way and which open up space for women in their subjecthood, subjectivity, resistance, actions and dreams.

A panel commemorating Olgaç on the 20th anniversary of her death will host actresses Füsun Demirel and Perihan Savaş at Istanbul Modern on March 20.

The festival also presents a new workshop this year: Kaleidoscope. The workshop will screen a film made by a male filmmaker that focuses on or looks at women, and then a discussion on the film will be held together with the director. The first host of the workshop will be Reha Erdem with his film, “Jîn.” Kaleidoscope will be at Pera Museum on March 16.

Festival programs will be available at festival venues and the festival website, while festival cards and tickets will be available at www.mybilet.com.