Imre Azem

Ecumenopolis: City Without Limits" tells the story of Istanbul and other Mega-Cities on a neo-liberal course to destruction. It follows the story of a migrant family from the demolition of their neighborhood to their on-going struggle for housing rights. The film takes a look at the city on a macro level and through the eyes of experts, going from the tops of mushrooming skyscrapers to the depths of the railway tunnel under the Bosphorous strait; from the historic neighborhoods in the south to the forests in the north; from isolated islands of poverty to the villas of the rich. It's an Istanbul going from 15 million to 30 million. It's an Istanbul going from 2 million cars to 8 million. It's the Istanbul of the future that will soon engulf the entire region. It's an Istanbul nobody has ever seen before.

Perhaps the city is what remains after the buildings, streets, and memories that hold the city together are buried under ruins. Maybe a ’voice’ will gather all this ruin and bring it together. The Hatay Academy Symphony Orchestra has set out for this. One rail of this ’high-speed train’, which is heading towards disaster faster and faster, is the ’state of emergency’ and the other rail is ’debris’. To change today, we all need to pull the emergency brake, we need to stop this train. Artists from Hatay are in solidarity for this journey. A year has passed and they have turned our pain into something bearable. Without them, this pain would be insupportable.

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Documentary filmmaker İmre Azem interviewed dozens of Hatay residents for the documentary “Hatay: 17-24 April 2023” in order to understand and tell the story Hatay after the devastating 6 February 2023 earthquakes. Then came the follow-up documentary “Hatay: 1-11 September 2023”. Now Azem continues this series, which acts as an archive as well, with “Hatay: 5-15 February 2024” in which we visit Hatay for the third time on the anniversary of the February 6 earthquakes. The daffodils we hold tightly in our hands is still at Köprübaşı bridge, impatient to reach the Asi River. “The daffodil symbolizes hope and new beginnings,” they say, “it represents the awakening of nature and points to a brand new beginning.” #YouAreNotAloneYouWillHeal

A city that has been injured with all its layers… The need of the local people to repair themselves and their city, to mourn their loss and their city, an admirable sense of belonging and ownership… Documentary maker İmre Azem meets with dozens of Hatay people on April 17-24.

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It is early September. Seven months after the February earthquakes, a suffocating cloud of dust hangs over Hatay. As time passes, one can feel the uncertainty attempting to sap the hopes of the local population. In this follow-up documentary, director Imre Azem retraces the path he took in Hatay back in April 2023, turning his camera to what happened, what did not happen, and what should have happened.

Imre Azem filmed the first in a series of documentaries about Hatay following the February 6th earthquakes in April 2023. Over the past two and a half years, he has attempted to understand and portray what happened in Hatay through three more documentaries. Now, in the fifth documentary of this series, we witness lives becoming increasingly difficult in every sense, escalating health problems, and the unrecognizable new face of the city. We ask ourselves: Could it have been otherwise? Is a city whose memory has been erased still the same city?