News Posts List

The American Turkish Society
and Moon and Stars Project
305 E. 47th Street New York, NY 10017
www.americanturkishsociety.org
www.moonandstarsproject.org

The 12th New York Turkish Film Festival opens on December 3

New York, NY [October 26, 2010]– The American Turkish Society and Moon and Stars Project are pleased to present the 12th New York Turkish Film Festival to be held on December 3‐5 and 10‐12, 2010 at the School of Visual Arts Theatre in New York City. Now celebrating its twelfth year, the New York Turkish Film Festival has drawn as much as 8,000 viewers, screening over 300 inspiring, handpicked films, to date, including Turkish contemporary, early classic, documentary and short films. This year’s festival will screen a selection of 12 feature films and 9 short films.

The 12th New York Turkish Film Festival has been made possible by a generous grant from the Turkish Cultural Foundation and by public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts, celebrating 50 years of building strong, creative communities in New York State’s 62 counties. The festival is also supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council. In addition, the festival has been made possible through the contributions of the following organizations and businesses: The Marmara Manhattan, Paragraf Basım, Turkish Culture and Tourism Office in New York and Turkish Kitchen as gold sponsors; MTS Logistics, Ramerica International, and UPM-Kymmene Kağıt Ürünleri as silver sponsors. “We rely on the continued generous support of our grantors, sponsors, donors, advertisers, members, and friends as we strive to offer the best of Turkey’s rising national film industry to foreign film enthusiasts in the U.S.,” remarked Selen Ucak, Executive Director of The American Turkish Society.

The lineup for the 12th New York Turkish Film Festival includes an impressive selection ranging from documentaries to drama that portrays intriguing stories and colorful characters from everyday life. Pelin Esmer’s award winning film 11’e 10 Kala (10 to 11) depicts the captivating story of a superintendent who discovers an elderly resident’s unusual collections of ephemera. In Kosmos, director Reha Erdem offers the utopian vision of a man - a thief who is welcomed in the snow-bound border village of Kars after saving a young boy’s life. İlksen Başarır’s Başka Dilde Aşk (Love in Another Language) depicts the heartwarming love story between a deaf man and a hearing woman who has to speak to strangers all day at her call center job. İki Dil Bir Bavul (On The Way To School) by Orhan Eskiköy and Özgür Doğan follows a young Turkish language teacher into a remote Kurdish village, where he confronts language barriers. The documentary series feature Tülay German: Ateş ve Kor Yılları (Tülay German: Years of Fire and Cinders), the astounding story of the Turkish singer, who, following her leftist husband, fled to Paris in the 1960s, becoming the voice of immigrants there.

In addition to screenings in New York, The American Turkish Society and Moon and Stars Project, with generous support from the Turkish Cultural Foundation, continue to work with various centers across the United States to make the Turkish cinema available to broader audiences. Madison Association of Turkish Students, Turkish American Association of Milwaukee, Turkish American Cultural Association of Washington State and Turkish Student Association of Cornell University have produced their own Turkish Film Festivals by sharing the 12th New York Turkish Film Festival program.

Kaan Nazli of Moon and Stars Project said in a statement last week, “The invaluable contribution of the Turkish Cultural Foundation makes it possible to bring our festival that is central to promoting Turkish arts to audiences outside of New York. For the impact of our programs to expand exponentially, these kinds of national collaborations are of central importance.” Interested parties should also stay tuned for The American Turkish Society and Moon and Stars Project’s upcoming program, ‘The Space Between: A History of Turkish Cinema,’ an unprecedented Turkish film retrospective to be presented in collaboration with the Film Society of Lincoln Center in November of next year.

The American Turkish Society, founded in 1949, is America’s oldest not-for-profit organization seeking to enhance economic, political, and cultural ties between Turkey and the United States. The Society also initiates and sponsors a variety of education and arts & culture programs, providing fellowships, grants, and other opportunities for cultural exchange between the two countries. Founded in 2002, the Moon and Stars Project is dedicated to highlighting the changing face of Turkish arts and culture and establishing a two-way cultural interaction between the United States and Turkey.

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Public Information:

Tickets: Admission for each film screening is $12. Tickets can be purchased at www.newyorkturkishfilmfestival.com or at will call before each screening.

Festival Passes: Festival passes are also available for $100, which allows viewers to attend all screenings. Viewers can also purchase a pass and become an ATS member for $150. To obtain more information and to purchase a pass, please visit www.newyorkturkishfilmfestival.com.

Location: SVA Theatre, 333 West 23rd Street (between 8th and 9th Streets)

Subway: C, E to 23rd Street. Walk west on 23rd St. to the theatre.

Media Contact: Doga Kayalar-Polat, (212) 583-7617 or d.kayalar@americanturkishsociety.org; cinema@moonandstarsproject.org.

** For the Turkish version of this press release, please click here. **