Nathalie Rothschild
posted 23 February 2006

Director Fatih Akin (Head-On) has scripted and filmed this documentary, in which we follow Alexander Hacke, a member of the German avant-garde band Einstürzende Neubauten, around Istanbul on a scattered and incoherent musical journey.

The Buena Vista Social Club-type narrative doesn't really work for Hacke, who uses a 'magic mike' to capture exotic sounds from all over the world. His final comment at the end of the film that he had not managed to understand Istanbul, but had only 'scratched its surface' really said it all. Having crammed in a neo-psychedelic group, rock bands, rappers, DJs, gypsy, Kurdish and arabesque musicians to name but a few, the film doesn't after all prove that there is anything unique to the sound of Istanbul. In fact, a very similar film could have been made in London with the messages of multicultural diversity and 'East meeting West' remaining intact. After all, all sorts of sounds and musical traditions can be found here too.

There are some highlights in the film, for example when Hacke follows the gypsy Selim Sesler to his home town Kesan. This side-tracking doesn't really make sense as the documentary is about the sound of Istanbul, but its one of the most enjoyable sequences of the film. In Kesan, the musicians join a Fasil, a traditional gypsy gathering of jamming and drinking, and as Sesler says himself, it is indeed difficult to sit still when listening to the gypsy music. Another musical high point is the recording of the Kurdish musician Aynur in an old hamam (Turkish bath) with amazing acoustics. Singing lamentations about her oppressed people, Aynur's beautiful voice cuts like a knife.

Apart from observing the vast amount of musical exploration taking place in modern-day Istanbul, the film and its real-life characters also repeatedly comment on the Asian-European divide, or, as some would have it, the falseness of this notion. The band members of Orient Expressions for example believe that it's an 'ideological myth' that the orient begins in India and ends in Istanbul and that the occident begins in Istanbul and ends in Los Angeles. The most interesting revelations in this film are those that come out inadvertently - like the youngsters who speak of not having discovered Turkish music until the age of 19, thereby also discovering a sense of identity, which they express through their music. This, again, doesn't seem very different from the experience of many Western youth who go searching for their roots as part of the process of growing up.

The documentary is enjoyable to watch, but because it covers such varying subjects and musical styles, it ends up taking the melting pot point too far, blending messages and voices into a cluttered narrative. For the most part it would have been preferable if the director had let the musicians stick to what they know best - music.