In a remote village in eastern Turkey, an art teacher named Samet (Deniz Celiloglu) enters his fourth and final year at an undesirable state-mandated teaching post. Before he leaves, however, he will have to navigate two tricky relationships: the first with Sevim (Ece Bagci), a young student who accuses him of inappropriate behaviour and kickstarts a formal investigation; the second with Nuray (Merve Dizdar), a fellow educator and potential love interest, whose political engagement challenges his well-worn apathy. Both will push him into existential crisis, forcing him to reconsider his place in the world. With About Dry Grasses, Palme d’Or-winning filmmaker Nuri Bilge Ceylan delivers his richest, most expansive film yet. Against the harsh climes and forbidding landscapes of the Eastern Anatolian steppes, the Turkish director unfolds a philosophically profound tale of idealism and inaction, anchored by commanding performances from Dizdar (who won the Best Actress prize at Cannes) and Celiloglu. Novelistic in scale and yet startlingly intimate, this is a cinematic experience like no other.
Best Actress, Cannes 2023
Community Partner
Merve Dizdar, Deniz Celiloglu, Musab Ekici, Ece Bağci, Erdem Şenocak
Turkey/France/Germany/Sweden
2023
Showcase
In Turkish with English subtitles
Book Tickets
Indigenous & Community Access
Indigenous Access Tickets Community Access Tickets Ticket Donation Requests
Credits
Executive Producer
Mediha Didem Türemen
Producer
Alexandre Mallet-Guy, Janine Jackowski, Jonas Dornbach, Maren Ade, Nadir Öperli, Kristina Börjeson, Anthony Muir, Sébastien Beffa
Screenwriter
Akin Aksu, Ebru Ceylan, Nuri Bilge Ceylan
Cinematography
Cevahir Şahin, Kürşat Üresin
Editor
Oğuz Atabaş, Nuri Bilge Ceylan
Original Music
Philip Timofeyev, Giuseppe Verdi
Art Director
Meral Aktan
Director
Nuri Bilge Ceylan
Nuri Bilge Ceylan was born in Istanbul on January 26, 1959. In 1976, he started studying chemical engineering at the Istanbul Technical University, At the end of 1993, he started shooting his first short film, Koza. The film was screened in Cannes in May 1995 and became the first Turkish short film selected for the Cannes Film Festival. Uzak (2003) won the Grand Prix and the Best Actor Award for the two leads at Cannes in 2003. His next films all won awards at Cannes. In 2006, Climates won the FIPRESCI International Critics’ Award, in 2008 Three Monkeys won the Best Director Award and in 2011 Once Upon a Time in Anatolia won the Grand Prix again. In 2014, his seventh feature film Winter Sleep won the Palme d’Or and the FIPRESCI International Press Award. With The Wild Pear Tree, in 2018, he returned to the Official Selection in Competition at the Cannes Film Festival.
Filmography: Three Monkeys (2008); Once Upon a Time in Anatolia (2011); Winter Sleep (2014); The Wild Pear Tree (2018)
Missing VIFF? Check out what's playing at the VIFF Centre
The Blue Star
In crisis, a popular singer quits Spain to backpack in Argentina. There he comes under the spell of a veteran musician, who teaches him the art of chacareras, zambas and vidalas. It's a journey of musical kinship and spiritual reawakening.
The Mother and the Bear
Johnny Ma’s film stars Kim Ho-jung as a Korean woman who flies to Winnipeg when her immigrant daughter is hospitalized there. This crowd-pleaser plays up cultural differences to hilarious effect and offers a touching take on mother-daughter tension.
Forastera
In this mysterious and subtle coming of age drama, teenager Cata is soaking up the sun, smoking furtive cigarettes, and enjoying a summer break with her grandparents and her younger sis in Mallorca. That is, until Cata's beloved abuela collapses...