Aysecik ve Sihirli Cüceler Rüyalar Ülkesinde |
Turkey • 1971 • 88m •
   • Directed by: Tunç Basaran. • Starring: Zeynep Degirmencioglu, Süleyman Turan, Metin Serezli, Suna Selen, Ali Sen, Mine Sun, Cemal Konca, Sitki Sezgin, Ilhan Hemseri, Mürvet Issever, Aüszük Çudidifer, Semra, Seda. • Music by: Torgut Ören.  A young girl named Aysecik lives on her parents' farm, when an animated tornado carries her and her dog Banju in their house to Rüyalar Ulkesinde.
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Review:
It's safe to assume that not a great deal of money was available to the producers of this film, so they had no chance of it standing up against the 30's film. Watching the ways that they ingeniously cut costs is a lot of fun. For instance, there was no chance of having a real tornado at the beginning of the film to transport Aysecik away, so all of a sudden the human characters become poorly-animated cartoons and the tornado is portrayed as a few wiggly lines instead. The effect is startlingly hilarious. Similarly, no money was available to build a real yellow brick road, so instead our characters cavort and dance in lush green fields and Mediterranean countryside.
The song-and-dance routines are highlights of the film and range from the abysmal to the annoyingly catchy and lively. Watching them is a lot of fun as the characters dance madly and display little or no self respect. The acting is over-exaggerated and incredible to behold, obviously there's no subtlety in Turkish films, instead people are egged on to be as over-the-top as humanly possible. Aysecik (or Dorothy as she is more commonly known) is played by the incredibly-named Zeynep Degirmencioglu who brings sweetness and light to her performance, one of many similar roles for the actress who was apparently a veteran at this sort of thing. The Scarecrow, on the other hand, is an annoying homosexual stereotype who sets alight to himself and is impaled and torn to shreds in the film's most shocking and intense moment (if he'd have been human, this would have been right at home in an Italian cannibal flick!).
The Tin Man is amusing to behold, and his makeup and suit fairly good, although his constant squeaking and rattling soon becomes grating. The Lion, in comparison, is just rubbish, with a poor shabby suit and a badly glued-on mane. The Wizard of Oz himself is just about as stereotypical and obvious as you can get, with his cone hat painted with stars and moons and bright blue robe, complete with straggling beard and huge moustache. The finale sees him fly away on a balloon for some reason. The Wicked Witch of the West is a hammy oatmeal-faced monster who dissolves into a piece of cloth when a bucket of water is thrown in her face! Also appearing are a group of miniature soldiers (a mixture of children and dwarf actors) who have the ability to appear and disappear at will and often pop up to muddy the otherwise straightforward story. A gang of evil soldiers is also slotted in to up the numbers.
The "Emerald City" is nothing more than a green child's toy castle, and just as convincing as such. The sound effects consist of weird computery-type noises and the film suffers from disconcerting jump-cut editing throughout. At the end of the film, there's also a battle between dancing cave men (!) and small soldiers for some reason, which involves the use of a cannon. I don't know why but there you go. The film ends with the Good Witch transporting Aysecik back to her own time and place which is of course a foregone conclusion. Although undoubtedly a bad and poorly-made movie, THE Turkish WIZARD OF OZ is lively throughout and worth seeing because it's so foreign and the characters and situations so unpredictable to the western mind - you never know what's going to happen next.
Review by Leofwine_draca from the Internet Movie Database.
Movie Database