Program Note
Mehmet is a custodian of a grey high-story apartment in an unknown city in Turkey. Due to a new government policy, he is having a new antenna installed in the apartment, but the installation engineer suddenly dies. As the public TV channel starts their broadcast, a strange, sticky black fluid begins to leak into the apartment building and residents who come in contact with the fluid change into weird, faceless creatures. Mehmet starts to search the apartment building top find the cause.
This low budget SF dystopia is Orcun Behram’s debut film. The Antenna demands attention with its carefully-planned audiovisual techniques, which include minimal production design and meticulously-planned film and sound. The familiar story of an individual who engages in a life and death struggle in the midst of totalitarian suppression and claustrophobia is reborn through the unique atmosphere created by Behram’s stylish directing. From the film’s gloomy images, it’s easy to cast a critical eye over Turkey’s political and social situation under Erdogan’s leadership. (Jin PARK)