Nereye Bakıyor Bu Adamlar

Where Are These Men Looking? (Nereye Bakıyor Bu Adamlar) (translated)

Movie · 1976 · 4 people

Osman F. Seden directed Nereye Bakıyor Bu Adamlar, a 1976 Turkish comedy led by Zeki Alasya and Metin Akpınar. It follows two provincials who cannot get used to big-city life and become advertising faces by chance. Made by Erman Film, it was shot in color on 35 mm and runs about 98 minutes. Ahmet Üstel wrote the script, Hürrem Erman produced, and the cinematographers were Kaya Ererez and Erdoğan Engin.

Metin travels with his friend Zeki from Eğin to Istanbul to find Ayşe, his betrothed since childhood. Strangers to the city, the pair survive all kinds of mishaps until their photographs are used in an advertising campaign and they become faces everybody knows. Meanwhile, the workers at the factory where Ayşe is employed have gone on strike over a collective agreement, and the owner and the workers are bargaining. With a little luck, Zeki and Metin get a chance to use their new popularity in those negotiations.

Alasya and Akpınar play Zeki and Metin, characters who share their first names; Meral Zeren (Ayşe) and Süleyman Turan (Tarık) complete the main cast. Osman Alyanak, Hakkı Kıvanç, Remziye Fırtına, Feridun Çölgeçen, Semih Sezerli, İhsan Özenç, Cahit Engin and Fadıl Garan appear in smaller roles.

DirectorOsman Fahir Seden
Production companyErman Film
Where Are These Men Looking? (Nereye Bakıyor Bu Adamlar) Where Are These Men Looking? (Nereye Bakıyor Bu Adamlar) Where Are These Men Looking? (Nereye Bakıyor Bu Adamlar) Where Are These Men Looking? (Nereye Bakıyor Bu Adamlar) Where Are These Men Looking? (Nereye Bakıyor Bu Adamlar) Where Are These Men Looking? (Nereye Bakıyor Bu Adamlar)

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Cast

Through different eyes

Family Viewer Asks whether the whole household can watch it; cares about humour and heart.

The Zeki Alasya and Metin Akpınar duo deliver a comedy that can make viewers of every age laugh. The scrapes two naive men from Eğin get into in Istanbul show, in a gentle way, what it is like to be a stranger in the big city. The strike and bargaining part may bore small children a little, but the grown-ups will smile there too. Grandparents and grandchildren can all watch it together.

History & Society Lens Asks about the period, the social background and what the work reflects.

Nereye Bakıyor Bu Adamlar places two big social themes of the 1970s inside a light comedy: migration from the provinces to the big city, and relations between workers and employers. Zeki and Metin, arriving in Istanbul from Eğin and never quite getting used to it, are a familiar reflection of that era's migration experience. Their sudden fame as faces everyone knows, thanks to an advertising campaign, offers an interesting look at a rising culture of advertising. And bringing in the strike and collective-agreement bargaining at the factory where Ayşe works turns the film from a mere romp into a small document of the working life of its time.

Cinephile Looks at script, editing and directing choices; keeps a distance from formula films.

Ahmet Üstel's script follows a template common in comedies of the period, two provincials adrift in the big city, and barely pushes against its limits. Having Alasya and Akpınar play characters who share their own first names hands the film largely to the duo's chemistry, yet the narrative isn't sturdy enough to carry that load. The shift from fish-out-of-water gags to strike negotiations feels forced, as if two separate stories had been pinned together. Still, the satire built around the advertising idea is well placed and clever for its time. Enjoyable for fans of the pair, but structurally a rather loose comedy.

These are not reader reviews: they are short editorial takes written from different viewer perspectives with AI assistance. Reader reviews are below.

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