Biyograficim
Tatil Kitabı

Summer Book (Tatil Kitabı)

Movie · 2008 · 8 people

Seyfi Teoman wrote and directed Tatil Kitabı (internationally Summer Book), his first feature, a 92-minute Turkish drama. It opened on 12 September 2008, premiered in the Forum section of the Berlin Film Festival, and won the Best Turkish Film prize in the national competition of the 27th Istanbul International Film Festival.

The story covers one summer in a family from Silifke, told mostly through Ali, the shy younger son. His father Mustafa (Osman İnan), a lemon merchant, has a harsh temper. When his older son Veysel, a military-school student in Istanbul, wants to sit the university entrance exam, Mustafa fiercely opposes it and forces Ali to work through the holidays and learn the trade. He is also at odds with his wife Güler (Ayten Tökün) and brother Hasan (Taner Birsel), but this recedes when Mustafa suffers a brain haemorrhage on the way back from a business trip to Ürgüp and falls into a coma. Hasan, who must hold the family together, changes most. Rıza Akın appears as an ambulance driver.

The film came about through the joint effort of a Boğaziçi University film centre and the magazine Altyazı, with support from the Hubert Bals Fund of the Rotterdam Film Festival. Nadir Öperli and Yamaç Okur produced it, and Arnau Valls Colomer shot it.

DirectorSeyfi Teoman
Production companyBulut Film

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Cast

Rıza Akın Actor · 1955 – 2022 Taner Birsel Taner Birsel Actor · born 1959 Tayfun Gunay Harun Ozuag Ayten Tokun Osman Inan Zafer Inan Burcu Sanli

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Through different eyes

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

In his debut, Seyfi Teoman rests the family drama on the gaze of the character who speaks least, Ali, the shy younger son. That choice keeps the film clear of melodrama: the father's harsh temper, the older brother's wish to go to university and the tension at home reach us through the perception of a child on the sidelines rather than an adult at the centre of events. The same restraint, though, sometimes makes the story too distant; in my view the shifting balance after the father falls into a coma, especially the change in Hasan, the character who transforms most, never quite gains the dramatic weight it deserves. Its Berlin Forum selection and the Best Turkish Film prize in Istanbul show that this spare language still struck a strong chord.

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

Telling of one summer in a family of lemon merchants in Silifke, the film puts provincial paternal authority and the handing down of a trade at its centre. The older son wanting to sit the university entrance exam after military school, and the father making the younger one work through the holidays, set two futures against each other: carrying on the family business or opening up another life through education. It is a tension many provincial families in Turkey know well. The uncle having to hold the family together once the father is out of the picture also shows how quickly roles can change hands within an extended family.

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

Its subject is a family story through and through, but it isn't a family film. There's a harsh father, tension at home and a head of the household who falls into a coma; for young children it will feel heavy and slow. On the other hand, watched with teenagers caught between their parents' wishes and their own dreams, it can start a good conversation. Better for high-school age and up. Viewers not used to calm, quiet dramas will need a little patience.

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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