A part of me hates to bump an entry about Virginia Tech student Henry Lee who needlessly lost his life at all too young age for this, but for the longest time I have wanted to post an entry about Cuneyt Arkin. TheTurkish matinee idol will turn 70 in September. Arkin has starred in over 300 films, including my personal favorite Turkish melodrama "Hayatim Sana Feda" -My Life Belongs to You, Feda (1970). He also starred in the amusing nationalist Battal Gazi series of the '70s, in which basically all Byzantines (Greeks) are basically shown to be like Arabs in a Chuck Norris film. I actually wrote about 'Feda,' which also starred legendary Turkish actress Turkan Soray, in my college thesis on Turkish cinema! Arkin also starred in "Turkish Star Wars" (1982) which my friend Jason Garnett let me introduce at the Grandin Cinema in my hometown of Roanoke, Va. in 2005. We had 60 people come out for the midnight screening, and they actually paid to watch the movie! But, I must give credit to this entry to one person above anyone else_my good friend Bilge Ebiri, an independnt filmmaker in New York. He has several Youtube clips from the Arkin filmography in his commercial blog that makes my blog here look like "The Turkish Star Wars!" They were posted today. I really like the one from "Yikilmayan Adam"-The Man Who Couldn't Be Brought Down
(1977). Ebiri did not mention if he intends to cast Arkin in any of his own films, however.........wonder why?!
Links (may be blocked on public pcs, though the site is NOT an adult site):
http://www.nerve.com/nerveblog/screenblog.aspx?blogid=107
PS_ for info on the Henry Lee Memorial Scholarship see the entry below
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