Clouds of May | Telescope Film
Clouds of May

Clouds of May (Mayıs Sıkıntısı)

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  • Turkey
  • 1999
  • · 130m

Director Nuri Bilge Ceylan
Cast Emin Ceylan, Muzaffer Özdemir, Fatma Ceylan, Mehmet Emin Toprak, Muhammad Zimbaoglu
Genre Comedy, Drama

This is a movie within a movie, about a director, Muzaffer, who goes back to his hometown to make a film using a cast of local people (based on the director Ceylan's first feature, Kasaba). While Muzaffer is around, his mother complains about simple health problems, his father is in a legal fight against the government for his land, his cousin leaves his job to help Muzaffer who promises to find him work in Istanbul, and his little cousin Ali tries to carry an egg in his pocket for forty days so that he'll get the watch of his dreams. In the meantime, they form the cast for Muzaffer's movie as well.

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What are critics saying?

80

Time Out

The lovely substance is in the wit, the nuances, the rhythms, and Ceylan's own very fine colour camerawork.

80

The New York Times by A.O. Scott

The film's shapeliness and depth are not immediately apparent; for much of its running time, it feels diffuse and anecdotal, but in retrospect you appreciate the subtlety and heft of the story, as well as the tricky profundity of Mr. Ceylan's approach.

75

Chicago Tribune by Michael Wilmington

This subtle, beautifully shot film is a gently ironic study of the relationship between a Turkish filmmaker, who has returned to his country home to make an independent movie, and his elderly father, whom he has recruited as an actor. [13 Oct 2000, p.L]

70

Variety by David Stratton

Though it moves more slowly than the tortoise prominently featured in one sequence, Clouds of May is the kind of film that creeps up on the patient viewer.