Four Women in the Harem (1965) by Halit Refiğ: The Construction of "National Cinema" in Turkey

on july 27, 1966, the renowned Turkish film director Halit Refiğ angrily left a panel discussion on Turkish cinema. Organized by the film writers' association Sinematek, the panel was titled "The Social Structure of Turkey, Turkish Cinema and Its Future." According to Refiğ, the panel had expanded from a discussion of Turkish cinema and its future and turned into a courtroom in which Turkish filmmakers were put on trial, and filmmakers including Refiğ were deeply insulted at being framed as the enemies of society (Refiğ 71). After intense disagreement with Sinematek writers on the condition of Turkish cinema, Halit Refiğ and some other film directors developed the concept of what they called ulusal sinema (national cinema).

Although Halit Refiğ's historical film Haremde Dört Kadin (Four Women in the Harem, 1965) was produced one year before the debate, before the idea of national cinema took shape and the concept began to be used consciously (Türk 226),¹ Refiğ retrospectively referred to this film as a prime example of his concept of national cinema (Akser and Durak-Akser 61).² Refiğ's selection of this film after the fact was far from random. Rather, it was a conscious act because Four Women in the Harem made statements not only about the past but also about the then-present discussion on the identity of Turkish cinema. It is an early example that both reflects and constructs some of the key aspects of what Refiğ would later call national cinema.

By taking a traditional social institution, the harem in transition, as the film's subject and by using fictional historical characters, Refiğ engages in a dialogue with the then-current debates about Turkey aligning with the West or resisting as an independent nation—responding to the pro-Western film critics via his film. In doing so, he pays particular attention to underlining the cultural differences between Western and Turkish society, trying to define the national identity of the Turks against the culture of Westerners. He exemplifies the differences by emphasizing the roles of family, state, Islamic religion, and traditional arts in Turkish-Ottoman culture, while demonstrating the negative effects of Westernization in history. In this respect, the film can be described as an example of the construction of identity in the then-present day through the reconstruction of the past (Burke 105).

Refiğ's use of the term "national cinema" is a broad one; he provides both a formal and an industrial definition of national cinema in his writings. He also defines "national" by means of the via negativa—that is, by what national cinema is not, rather than by what it is. The representatives of the movement, Halit Refiğ, Metin Erksan, Atıf Yılmaz, and Duygu Sağıroğlu, were unified in what they opposed as well. It can be said that the national cinema movement was a deliberate reaction to what Refiğ called "Westernists" in Turkey—notably, the Sinematek writers (Hristidis 203).

According to Refiğ, the Sinematek writers argued,

Cinema is a universal art. The standards of this universal art are set in the West. Making a good film means making it like Westerners. As long as Turkish cinema doesn't reach the Western level, one should not pay attention to Turkish films. As long as Turkish cinema is not given recognition by the West, one should not talk about Turkish cinema, but instead promote and adopt films from the West in Turkey for the Turkish audience.

(Akser and Durak-Akser 61)

Refiğ's thesis can be understood as the antithesis of this argument. In Refiğ's view, the argument that "art is universal" serves the interests of Western cultural imperialism in Turkey. His understanding of what the West is has to do with humanism, capitalist economy, individualism, and positivism. He objects to these pathways for the Turkish people and Turkish cinema:

As the social realities of each country differ, Turkish cinema cannot be judged by Western or universal standards, but by the Turkish people's own cultural values and standards. . . . The...