The Cut

Faith Akin really likes personal stories. And it shows here, where you have a big part of Armenian history, which isn't talked about much as Sid Haig told me at Convention. But something that is very real for the people and part of their heritage and history, they haven't dealt with that much.

It's also a topic that you won't be likely to see in a Hollywood movie. So this international production helps shed some light on it. By going personal, it makes it more relatable. It also makes it open for discussion if it should be broader and show many more things that went down during that time. You could argue about the ability of most people to talk in English, but that has been done many times and is to make this more accessible worldwide and should not distract you too much from what the movie tries to tell you

I should say Faith Akin is currently one of the most important directors from Germany of Turkish descent. He brought a fresh spirit to German and Turkish film scene. He shows also great courage with the theme Armenian Genocide. He explains a personal story, but also takes a step to the Armenians from Turkish side, and try to say "we understand your suffering." Regrettably that is enough to be excommunicated from Turkish community, because it is still a taboo to talk about Armenian problem in such a way.

It is a pity that he missed such a great chance to create a good film with his humanistic intentions. Most of the scenes feel like staged, acting is mostly average. The main problem with the movie is the atmosphere. When I see a good movie, I forget that it is a movie and create an emotional connection with the characters. That is the most important thing for me as I evaluate a film. And it lacked completely for me. It could be the worst cinematographic work of Faith Akin till now. Still deserves above average from me.

Tahir Rahim ('A Prophet') stars as Nazarat an Armenian artisan in the town of Mardin. World War I is raging and the Ottoman Turks have thrown in their lot with the forces of Germany and her allies. In Turkey a decision is made to do something about the Christian Armenians. Nazarat is rounded up and forced to work as slave labour – leaving his wife and twin daughters alone to their fate.

What befalls him is horrific and what befell the Armenians was a war crime and a crime against humanity. In the aftermath of his travails Nazarat hears that his daughters have survived the blood bath, he then sets out to find them and the majority of the film is taken up with his search.

Now this is a fairly good effort, it is a bit shameless at tugging on the heart strings though. It was a wide European co-production and that is reflected in the languages being used. The main language though is English, which is used by most of the players here. That may be why it has faced criticism of some of the acting. That criticism is that some of it was a bit hammy or wooden. It is harder to act in a non native tongue so a lot of the nuances are lost.

Rahim is as ever excellent and believable and as a central character to the film he manages to hold it all together very well. There are some plot holes and I could not find if this was based on an actual real story. However, it is fairly engaging and with a run time of around two hours managed to keep me gripped for the most part hence my rating.

I found "The Cut" to be quite an amazing film. The story is epic almost biblical and unforgettable. Through the horrors of the Armenian genocide a few acts of humanity make all the difference. It's probably not the best film for the flapjack eating simpleton but if you can handle subtitles, respect other cultures and appreciate profound human experience, pick this one up. It certainly beats the prepackaged, formula, market tested, predictable hogwash vomited out of Hollywood year after year.

Faith Akin's epic tale of hope and survival, set in the time of the Armenian Genocide amidst the Great War and the resulting diaspora all over the world. I watched 'The Cut' lately during the London Film Festival, and found it worth the time in general and definitely had its good moments. It did not go for over-sentimentality and didacticism but rather showed an impressive journey of search and survival. For me, the wide shots in the desert and in the streets of Cuba were special, and there was very good work with costumes and set decoration. Some might argue that Armenians and Turks speaking English felt unnatural but it was totally justified for me.

However, the film fell short in several aspects, and during viewing I constantly had the feeling that much more could have been done with the powerful story that could have greatly enriched and added more depth to the end-product. The poor screenplay dialogue was the most obvious shortcoming in the film, and while its over-simplicity can be regarded by some as appealing minimalism, it remained a huge disappointment. One scene epitomised the problem here, when the protagonist discovered that his daughters were still alive, his friend shouted exuberantly with no more than "This is good .. this is good ". It is possible here that using the English language presented a problem. The contrived ending was, to a lesser extent, irritating as well but the slow camera work saved it. I found a particular scene very interesting, when the Turks were evacuating the Syrian city and a Turkish boy got injured by a thrown stone, and the protagonist's reaction, and I wish there were more of these side stories, like watching Chaplin's 'The Kid'.

In addition to screenplay, several techniques could have added more to the story; exposition by flashbacks at different parts of the journey (some dreams were deployed but to a limited effect), voice- overs contemplating the condition of humanity at the time of war. A good soundtrack could have made a big difference as well, and in such a film I think dispensing of such a poor soundtrack altogether could have yielded a better result and added a minimalistic touch, although of course this would have been difficult with the protagonist speech handicap and the lack of a narrator.

The challenging task for the main actor, to rely entirely on facial expressions and body gestures because of handicap early in the narrative, was met by a solid performance, but could be easily overlooked by general audience because of the shortcomings of the other narration elements.

An impressive story of survival, and a very important yet overlooked subject in recent history compared with others of even less scale, but less impressive film. The beautiful shots and powerful story were not enough to elevate it to the epic legendary status, but it is still worth watching.