Recognizing "The Turkish Star Wars"

Since it is the 30th anniversary of the 1977 release of George Lucas' "Star Wars," I thought I would add an entry regarding the 1982 film "Dunyayi Kurtaran Adami" aka "The Man Who Saved the World," which is known all over the world as "The Turkish Star Wars." It stars Turkey's former box office icon Cuneyt Arkin (see earlier entry from April '07).
There have been two developments with the film recently. First, the whole entire film, not just youtube clips, are available for free on the internet! I actually started to watch it, but I've seen it three time and I am going to a concert in Floyd, Va. And, last year, the film had a sequel "Son of the Man Who Saved the World," which is reportedly even worse than the original. It was directed by another former Turkish box office icon Kartal Tibet (he played Tarkan in a series of cult film in the '70s). On the IMDB, the film has a 1.6 rating, which makes it the third lowest rated film in the entire online film database......wow!
Phil Hall of filmthreat.com recently wrote the following about the original "Turkish Star Wars" (pardon the pun):
"There's no Luke Skywalker here, but instead we have two middle-age space jockeys who are leading the way. Unfortunately, there was no budget for a spaceship here........"
In May of 2005, I helped screened the film along with my friend Jason Garnett, manager of the Grandin Theatre in Roanoke. I was interviewed by another friend of mine tom Angleberger of "The Roanoke Times."
Here is one passage from that article based on my comments:
" It (The Turkish Star Wars) is not, however, a meaningless rip-off. The movie was made soon after the 1980 coup in Turkey and does have political messages about the gangs, corruption and chaos that followed."
Some how, I expect my friend Bilge Ebiri, a respected film ciritic and cinema blogger, may not completely agree with my assesment. But, we have both publicly professed to having a love-hate sentiment with regards to Arkin's films and other Turkish films from the 1970s, which remains the most unique and productive period in Turkish cinema history. Incidentally, there is also a "Turkish Star Trek!"


Useful links:

http://www.freemoviescinema.com

http://www.filmthreat.com