ABSTRACT
Since the mid-1990s, the films known collectively as the New Turkish Cinema (NTC) have attracted global audiences on the arthouse and film festival circuits, winning awards and gaining international exposure for Turkish filmmaking. As a major figure in this national new wave, Zeki Demirkubuz has assumed multiple key roles ranging from screenwriting and producing to directing and starring in several adaptations of canonical European literature, which he has recast to suit the moral values and physical spaces of contemporary Turkey. This chapter situates the NTC in conversation with the history of literary adaptation in Turkish screen media while outlining its transnational tendencies, and it examines Demirkubuz’s films such as Yazgı [Fate] (2001) and Yeraltı [Inside] (2012) to underscore the dual appeal of the NTC’s approach to film adaptation. Demirkubuz’s costumbrist approach ensures that the Turkish national audience can connect with both source and setting in these adaptations, while international audiences are likely to be introduced to an unfamiliar milieu through a canonically familiar narrative. The chapter concludes by considering how this approach to transnational adaptation in the NTC has influenced contemporary filmmaking in Turkey.
