Ten films selected for competition at Adana’s Golden Boll festival

Five of the 10 films heading to the national feature-film competition at Turkey’s Adana Golden Boll Film Festival will meet audiences for the first time in Adana. Their world premieres give this year’s competition a particularly prominent place for new Turkish cinema.

The selected films are Ali Özel’s “Expectation,” Tunç Şahin’s “Monster,” Miraç Atabey’s “Fashion Marriage,” Sinan Biçici’s “French Fries” and Muzaffer Mehmet Çağlar’s “Existence.” They will premiere at the festival, which is preparing to bring new Turkish productions together in Adana.

The other finalists have already begun their festival journeys. Alphan Eşeli’s “Mutter: A Mother’s Diary” will have its Turkish premiere after its world premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival. Banu Sıvacı’s “Daylight” follows a screening in the Forum section of the Berlin Film Festival. Pınar Yorgancıoğlu’s “Whistlers in the Dark” arrives after its world premiere at IFFI Goa, while Nuri Cihan Özdoğan’s “Dead Dogs Don’t Bite” follows its premiere at the Rotterdam Film Festival. Ali Vatansever’s “Alone Together” comes to the competition after its first screening at the Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival.

Zuhal Olcay will chair the national feature-film jury. The panel also includes actors Şebnem Bozoklu and Salih Bademci, director Erdem Tepegöz, screenwriter Nilgün Öneş, cinematographer Gökhan Tiryaki, and film writer and academic Ayça Çiftçi.

The festival received 1,094 submissions across six competitions. The national feature-film competition received 45 entries, while the documentary, international short, national short, student short and artificial-intelligence short competitions received 66, 154, 412, 312 and 105 films respectively. Its feature screenplay competition for literary adaptations received 54 projects. Winners will be announced at the awards and closing ceremony on Oct. 3.