Ali Vatansever

For the terminally ill Izzet, time is nearly up. Doctors have given up, prayers and rituals offer little help, and his family's future is now in God's hands. So Izzet spends his time in virtual reality, roaming through the astonishing and otherworldly places of the virtual cosmos. He even meets his girlfriend there…

Turkish director Ali Vatansever weighs the human cost of politically motivated urban renewal in his achingly resonant second feature, about a young couple forced to compromise their ideals and work for the very industry encroaching on their Istanbul neighbourhood, in order to keep up with the rent.

El Yazısı follows three stories on a day when the town is welcoming its very first foreign English teacher. As an accidental tourist is mistaken for her, the wind of change starts to blow.