Ararat

Perspektive Deutsches Kino 2023

Zeynep has caused a traffic accident in Berlin. To escape the consequences, she flees to her parents’ home in rural eastern Turkey. The atmosphere in this remote house at the foot of Mount Ararat is one of speechlessness and cold-hearted anger: each family member harbours personal and professional secrets that also affect the others. It appears that there is as much simmering below the surface within this family as there is deep beneath the snow-covered, dormant volcano that looms like a portent against the night sky. Zeynep’s self-destructive, sexually assertive behaviour causes the entrenched conflicts and tissue of lies that exist between mother, father, daughter and the people around them to burst open, hurling repressed feelings to the surface like magma.
In his feature film debut, director Engin Kundağ portrays relationships that are painfully dysfunctional on both private and social levels. In his assuredly composed, impressively dark tableaux, the barren landscape is mirrored in the sparse communication – and vice versa.

by Engin Kundağ
with Rasim Jafarov, Merve Aksoy, Funda Rosenland, Aziz Capkurt, Baran Seyhan, Engin Kundağ, Aysel Roza Germany 2023 Turkish, German 95’

With

Rasim Jafarov (Hasan)
Merve Aksoy (Zeynep)
Funda Rosenland (Fatma)
Aziz Capkurt (Ali)
Baran Seyhan (Doğan)
Engin Kundağ (Zeynep’s Husband)
Aysel Roza (Ibadova)

Crew

Director	Engin Kundağ
Screenplay	Engin Kundağ
Cinematography	Mikołaj Syguda
Editing	Evelyn Rack
Sound Design	Leandros Ntounis
Sound	Samet Yilmaz
Costumes	Ava Kundağ
Production Design	Nadide Argun Van Uden
Make-Up	Elif Kayran
Casting	Ava Kundağ, Engin Kundağ
Assistant Director	Majid Bakhtiari
Production Manager	Ekrem Çelik
Producers	Markus Kaatsch, Engin Kundağ
Executive Producer	Baran Seyhan
Co-Production	Saarländischer Rundfunk Saarbrücken
In Cooperation with	Arte

World sales

ArtHood Entertainment

http://www.arthoodentertainment.com http://www.arthoodentertainment.com

Produced by

Zeitgeist Filmproduktion

https://zeitgeist-film.de https://zeitgeist-film.de

Photos

Engin Kundağ

Born in Germany in 1984, the filmmaker attended school in the USA. He studied philosophy and psychology, followed by screenwriting and directing at the international film school (ifs) in Cologne from which he graduated in 2012.

Filmography (selection)

2012 Ararat; short film 2014 Torn; short film 2017 Hunt; short film 2023 Ararat

Bio- & filmography as of Berlinale 2023