"Someone once called time a silent saw. You never know what it'll do to us."
- Suleyman
At the outset, Nuri Bilge Ceylan's 'Wild Pear Tree' is the story of a young man navigating life's forks. There's a generous serving of judgment, bitterness, disappointment and resentment to go around. If you're looking to have a good time, please see something else. But if you want a story that blends family dynamics with social commentary, a story that's about a small town in western Turkey as much as it's about anyplace of any size on the planet, then the emotional payoff, and you'll have to wait for 3 hours, is well worth it.
Sinan Karasu, the protagonist, is a fresh college graduate, and hates coming back to his small hometown. He tells his friend "if I were a dictator, I'd drop an atom bomb on this place". And he has good reasons: his gambling-addicted father is indebted to half the town; his mother, in addition to not having the power to stop her husband, silently encourages by running the family with more debt; the town has no prospects for the young and educated.
Sinan, though a cynic, has a sharp eye and a sharper tongue. He has a draft of a "quirky autofiction novel" called 'Wild Pear Tree' which he tries to get published. He talks to the mayor of the town about securing some funds; the mayor morphs into an editor and advises to turn the material into a tourist propaganda. He's redirected to a local sand contractor who's labeled a reader and a patron of artistes. When Sinan has a chat with this contractor, it becomes apparent that he's nothing more than a small-time hard-working crook. When he runs into a famous writer, instead of being nice to curry a favor, he lets his disenchantment and disillusionment get the better of him and drives him to a shouting match.
This film is a real talkie. Most of the film is two people talking, gradually ramping up the decibel, if not the sting. Sinan utters so many lacerations that one has to wonder if he can be a good writer if he lacks this much empathy. When he bumps into a young woman, alone, one he had a crush on in high-school, instead of asking how things have been in the town in his absence he says "all these small-minded, bigoted people like peas in a pod." She feels the sting; she's not a college graduate like him; she's started wearing a head-scarf; she's a small-town girl. But she's not stupid. She punishes Sinan in a way that seems fitting.
Of these episodic conversations that make up the film, the most touching ones are the interactions between the father and the son. The son is ashamed that anywhere he runs into, people remind him of his father's debts. In their conversations, the son is resigned and unforgiving. The father, immensely hurt at his failings, recognizes he can't change his behavior but begs for acceptance through his eyes. In a gently cruel act, Sinan sells his father's dog, an animal his father loves dearly because it's the only one that loves unconditionally. Does Sinan need the money? Yes. Does the father deserve to be bereft of the only thing that brings him joy? It's a difficult question to answer. Yes, the father has fallen down; but as the mother points out, "he never came home drunk and beat the kids like other dads". Sinan makes sure he distributes the pain in his life swiftly to others. How is he any better?
Like the novel Sinan has written, the movie is a visual collection of vignettes, essays about his town. It's about "life culture", as Sinan describes it. Digging a well on a dry hillock, as the father does, seems futile. But our family member's emotional and temperamental make-up comes in all sizes and shapes. The final act of the film, which I won't spoil here, delivers magnificently. Yes, we're misfits, but together we're a family, a society. By delving deep into a microcosm, Ceylan has transcended all cultural and regional boundaries. Life is hard. Even if there's no love, acceptance goes a long way. It makes life not only bearable, but rich.
