Climates

The difficulty of sustaining romance is the subject of this moody three-act Turkish drama charting a professor named Isa's troubled relationship with his girlfriend, a younger TV production designer named Bahar. Writer-director Nuri Bilge Ceylan also stars as Isa, whom we first meet during a summer seaside vacation trip with Bahar (played by Ceylan's wife Ebru), during which she abruptly (and, to him, inexplicably) breaks up with him. After an autumn interlude back in Istanbul, during which Isa has a rambunctious one-night stand with a former lover, Climates moves to a wintry locale where Bahar is working and Isa attempts a reconciliation, with decidedly mixed results. Climates captures the different moods of its three parts very well: the almost oppressively sun-baked locale of the opening half-hour contrasts beautifully with the drizzly Istanbul sequence, while the snowbound final act suggests the deep chill that settles between the erstwhile lovers. But the emotional opaqueness of the characters ultimately makes the film seem more like a slow-moving exercise in existential angst than a deeply-felt portrayal of a real relationship. Optional. [Note: DVD extras include a “making of” featurette, interviews with Nuri and Ebru Ceylan, and footage of the Cannes screening. Bottom line: a decent extras package for an uneven film.] (F. Swietek)