M. Mert Örsler
University of Toronto, Cinema Studies, Graduate Student
- Amateur Film, Basic Design, Celebrities, Communication Studies, Contemporary European Art Cinema, Digital Illustration, and 24 moreDigital Media, Documentary Film, Film historiography, Film Stars, Genre, Hollywood, Intertextuality, Media (And Adaptation) Studies, Meddah, Militant Cinema, National Cinemas, Nostalgia, Parody, Pastiche, Political cinema, Transnational Cinema, Turkish and Middle East Studies, Turkish Cinema, Turkish Television , Turkish television series, World Cinemas, Yesilcam Cinema, Acting in Yeşilçam Cinema, and Turkish TV Seriesedit
- Doctoral candidate in the Cinema Studies Institute at the U of T
Holds an MA in communication and media studies from the University of Calgary and a BA in communication and design from Bilkent Universityedit
Since the mid-1990s, the films known collectively as the New Turkish Cinema (NTC) have attracted global audiences on the arthouse and film festival circuits, winning awards and gaining international exposure for Turkish filmmaking. As a... more
Since the mid-1990s, the films known collectively as the New Turkish Cinema (NTC) have attracted global audiences on the arthouse and film festival circuits, winning awards and gaining international exposure for Turkish filmmaking. As a major figure in this national new wave, Zeki Demirkubuz has assumed multiple key roles ranging from screenwriting and producing to directing and starring in several adaptations of canonical European literature, which he has recast to suit the moral values and physical spaces of contemporary Turkey. This chapter situates the NTC in conversation with the history of literary adaptation in Turkish screen media while outlining its transnational tendencies, and it examines Demirkubuz’s films such as Yazgı [Fate] (2001) and Yeraltı [Inside] (2012) to underscore the dual appeal of the NTC’s approach to film adaptation. Demirkubuz’s costumbrist approach ensures that the Turkish national audience can connect with both source and setting in these adaptations, while international audiences are likely to be introduced to an unfamiliar milieu through a canonically familiar narrative. The chapter concludes by considering how this approach to transnational adaptation in the NTC has influenced contemporary filmmaking in Turkey.
Research Interests:
Cem Yılmaz’s comedic persona is unique in interweaving Turkish film history and Anglophone popular culture across multiple media platforms. This persona has almost become synonymous with comedy in Turkey. Placing an emphasis on Yılmaz as... more
Cem Yılmaz’s comedic persona is unique in interweaving Turkish film history and Anglophone popular culture across multiple media platforms. This persona has almost become synonymous with comedy in Turkey. Placing an emphasis on Yılmaz as a reflection of the nation’s transnational media consumption, the present article offers a closer look at how different media texts contribute to Yılmaz’s multimedia stardom.
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Media texts shape and reshape the public understanding of various topics, issues and discourses by representing them. Science-related themes and subjects are not an exception in that regard. The rising popularity and immense commercial... more
Media texts shape and reshape the public understanding of various topics, issues and discourses by representing them. Science-related themes and subjects are not an exception in that regard. The rising popularity and immense commercial success are the two significant factors to regard superhero films as one of the most interesting popular cultural texts to investigate the ways in which sustainable energy is represented. By focusing on how superhero cinema represents clean energy, this essay approaches The Avengers (2012) and Batman: The Dark Knight Rises (2012) from a critical and environmental point of view. Their shared release date contextually gains importance when the socio-historical atmosphere of 2012 in the US in relation to renewables is considered. By synthesizing a theoretically hybrid approach with the close-reading method and taking the two films as an example, this essay concentrates on interpreting the messages related to clean energy, their capitalistic underpinnings and the contextual-parallels behind the mediatization of sustainable energy.
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Cem Yılmaz has become nearly synonymous with Turkish comedy through comedies like Arif V 216 (2018). Taking this film as its focus, this article situates Yılmaz among his competitors while tracing his roots in Turkish entertainment by... more
Cem Yılmaz has become nearly synonymous with Turkish comedy through comedies like Arif V 216 (2018). Taking this film as its focus, this article situates Yılmaz among his competitors while tracing his roots in Turkish entertainment by discussing his relationship to mid-twentieth-century Yeşilçam and to the meddah storytelling tradition.