Coming-of-age story winner of Golden Boll Film Fest enters movie theaters

Esra Saydam (L) and Nisan Dağ during
the Golden Boll award ceremony.

The award-winning film “Across the Sea” (Deniz Seviyesi), a coming-of-age tale about a woman going back and forth between two countries and two men, will come to the big screen on Nov. 7 on the back of critical acclaim.

The film, by female directors Esra Saydam and Nisan Dağ, received six awards at the 21st International Golden Boll (Altın Koza) Film Festival, including the award for best director, and seems set to garner more awards from international festivals.

Saydam and Dağ told the Hürriyet Daily News that they were very excited to see their first feature film being released after winning awards from such a prestigious festival.

“The film is about a woman who needs to have a journey to her innocence; she is a child and she has to become an adult,” said Saydam, while Dağ described it in a Robert Frost-like manner, calling it “The road not taken.”

“The story is about a woman mentally stuck between two lives, the life she chooses and the one she missed,” said Dağ.

Damla, a Turkish woman who is six months’ pregnant that has been living in New York for the past eight years with her American husband, Kevin, faces her unburied past when they return to a seaside summer house in Turkey’s Ayvalık, where Damla spent her childhood summers. Damla, and thus Kevin, come across her old boyfriend, Burak, who holds more meaning for Damla than just love.

Commenting on how it was to direct a film with a partner, the co-directors defined it as a marriage and the film itself as their baby.

Saydam said they especially appreciated the shared duties when the director needed to be in two places at the same time. â€...