The Small Town

Saffet (Mehmet Emin Toprak) and his younger sister Asiye (Havva Sağlam) move through a year in their Turkish village, from the schoolroom to the fields and back to the family house. Around them the adults talk, and at the center of the film a campfire gathers the relatives to speak of the past and what life failed to give them. Nuri Bilge Ceylan, in his first feature, mostly keeps the camera at a patient distance and lets the town go on being itself.