Mustang: Translating Willful Youth

This book provides a critical analysis of the debut film Mustang by Deniz Gamze Ergüvens, exploring its portrayal of female coming-of-age and feminist dissent in the Turkish context. It discusses the film's universalizing focus on gender and youth, as well as its representation of gender and its impact on Turkish film critics and cultural theorists. The book aims to locate Mustang within the intersection of emerging female and youth narratives in Turkish cinema and offers a critical understanding of its local and global reception. It engages with both Anglophone and Turkish literature in youth cinema and gender studies and makes an original contribution to debates on national/transnational cinemas and gender/youth studies.

Format: Hardback
Length: 114 pages
Publication date: 05 December 2022
Publisher: Taylor & Francis Ltd

This captivating book delves into the critically acclaimed debut film of Turkey-born, France-based director Deniz Gamze Ergüvens, titled "Mustang" (2015). Set in a remote Turkish village, the film revolves around five orphaned sisters who live with their grandmother and uncle. With its familiar art-house style and universalizing focus on female coming-of-age and feminist dissent, "Mustang" garnered celebratory reviews from journalists and scholars of world cinema. However, its portrayal of youth in the Turkish national context and its representation of gender sparked a debate among Turkish film critics and cultural theorists. This debate questioned the politics of transnational feminism by critiquing the film's failure to capture the local intricacies of gender and youth politics.

While this book seeks to place "Mustang" within the emerging narratives of female and youth in Turkish cinema, it also offers a critical understanding of the differences in its local and global reception. By examining the geopolitics of representation, the book sheds light on the diverse criteria employed to evaluate Ergüvens stylistic choices. Drawing from both Anglophone and Turkish literature in youth cinema and gender studies, the book makes an original contribution to ongoing debates on national/transnational cinemas and gender/youth studies. It serves as an accessible reference for graduate and undergraduate students interested in exploring contemporary film.

Elif Akçalı, an Associate Professor in Film and TV Studies at Kadir Has University in Turkey, is the author of this insightful book. Her research encompasses film aesthetics, videographic criticism, non-fiction film, and gender/sexuality studies. Through her meticulous analysis, Akçalı provides a deep exploration of "Mustang's" themes and contributes to our understanding of the complexities of representation in contemporary cinema.

Weight: 390g
Dimension: 216 x 138 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780367543136