Özer Kiziltan was born 1963 in Istanbul and studied law at Istanbul University. He decided to leave prior to completing his degree in order to study cinema and television. Özer's decision to do so was partly based on his desire to use cinema to present stories about Turkish life to the rest of the world.
Özer eventually directed several award-winning shorts among which were Distress, Caution, Mice, Your Eyes are the Last Passion Fire of Yesilcam and The Last Birds Too are Gone. He has also directed a number of dramatic series for Turkish television.
In 1997, along with several filmmaker friends, Özer formed Yeni Sinemacular (New Filmmakers), a production company that has, to date, produced four critically acclaimed feature films, Takva being their fifth and most recent production. Takva was Turkey's submission to the Academy Awards for Best Foreign Film, and the decision generated a lot of controversy. Many criticized the film for portraying Turkey as 'a country of sects'. Özer's response to this criticism is quite simply: "I am not interested in making a Tourism brochure, I am researching a reality in this country."
Takva is a film that achieves an unusual balance between local authenticity and universal relevance, making it both a both a critical and commercial success in Turkey and hopefully elsewhere. The film's executive producer is Fatih Akin, the renowned Turkish-German filmmaker whose latest, The Edge of Heaven, was recently released in the U.S. and is one of the most acclaimed films of the year. Akin's editor, Andrew Bird, cut Takva for Özer.
Link TV is proud to be presenting the US TV premiere of Takva: A Man's Fear Of God. Please join our discussion board and tell us what you think of the film, and what else you'd like to see on Cinemondo. More notes...
