Revenge of the Snakes
The template for Turkey’s realist cinema, Metin Erksan’s masterpiece dissects the tensions that erupt in a small eastern village after a property dispute between neighbors.
A landmark in the history of filmmaking in Turkey whose importance has been compared to that of Open City for Italian cinema, Metin Erksan’s masterpiece cast a sharp gaze on the life in the backlands of Turkey’s eastern region. When the construction of a new house causes a dispute among neighbors, the fragile social fabric of a village comes undone, as rivalries, fears, and old, unsettled scores start to emerge. Featuring a first rate ensemble cast led by Fikret Hakan, Revenge of the Snakes proposes that centuries of neglect have led the inhabitants of the region to turn on each other rather than face a common enemy. Based on a novel by Fakir Baykurt, who was himself from the region, the film was denounced as Communist propaganda and would have been banned without the personal intervention of President Cemal Gürsel.
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