Dead Horse Nebula

Following several experimental shorts, Tarık Aktaş’ remarkable feature debut concerns seven-year-old Hay, who finds a dead horse in a field and witnesses how much effort it takes to get rid of this. Aktaş portrays the adult Hay’s life in relatively unrelated vignettes: wounded during ritual slaughter; a confusing meeting in a hospital; the felling of a tree.

References to Hay’s childhood memories are subtle: blood; a body on the beach; a recurring rope. The relationship between humanity and nature is crucial. The elements water and fire, earth and the air, all appear in the opening. Seemingly guileless realism with the unmistakable gut feeling of impending doom as the bearer of a spiritual line. In – as Paul Schrader put it – a “transcendental style”, Aktaş aligns with filmmakers such as Robert Bresson and Lisandro Alonso. Aktaş won Best Emerging Director in Locarno for this film.

Trailer

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