Image copyright © by Marcus Trahan

Distant

(Uzak, Turkish, 2002)

Shot one: A guy is walking across a snowy field toward the camera. This takes two minutes. He passes out of camera view. Shot two: a bus appears in the far distance. It approaches. This takes one minute. Now we see the credits, black with unintelligible noises over it. We’re six minutes into the film, 8640 frames of film have been wasted, and nothing has happened! Nothing continues to happen for 110 minutes. At one point two guys watch a boring movie on the TV, and it’s better than the film they’re in. A strong candidate for a Gerry award. The only thing of any interest to me was the little car they drive, which is a Smart. It’s cute. And it has more personality than anyone in the movie.

Lee: I liked it. Depressing movies about depressed people always make me feel so fortunate.