Turkish-German director Akın says his new movie ‘doesn’t apologize’ over Armenian issue

“The Cut,” Turkish-German director Fatih Akın’s new movie based on the 1915 events, made its long-anticipated world premiere at the 71st Venice Film Festival earlier this week. The film has received a mixed response from critics so far, but Akın says it has “fulfilled its purpose.” 

The Armenians say the World War I-era mass killings under the rule of the Ottoman Empire amounted to “genocide.” The Turkish state has always denied this, saying that any deaths were the result of civil strife that erupted when Armenians took up arms for independence in eastern Anatolia.

While “The Cut” takes the traumatic 1915 events as its starting point, what follows is a transcontinental journey story following the central character, Nazareth, trying to reunite with his family after the trauma of the massacres. Fatih Akın spoke to Hürriyet about the film, his motivations behind making it, and the initial critical reaction.

Q: One of the actors in the movie, Simon Abkarian, has said “The Cut is the movie that Armenians were waiting for.” So did you make this movie for Armenians?
A: Actually I made the movie mostly for Turks. I’m Turkish and I made this movie for my people. Cinema belongs to the whole world, anyone can take whatever they want from this movie. Simon sees it that way; he liked this movie and believed in his part in it. Maybe Armenians were not expecting a film like this from a Turk. Maybe that’s what we were trying to imply.

Q: Why did you make this movie?
A: Who else could it have been? Don’t get me wrong, I don’t see myself at center stage. [Turkish journalist] Hasan Cemal has a book on the genocide, and I have artist friends doing work on it. There’s a group of Turks who accept this, and...