Aperture

synopsis

Elif lives with her mother in a solitary cell. She opens her eyes to the world behind the iron bars.Her world is so small; her mother (Halime), sparrows, guards and her father whom she is looking forward to. Most of her tme is spent with her sick mother. She has few friends; the sparrows.

When she hears their voices, she rushes to the window and throws bread to the them. She gets happy when the guard brings her food but gets angry with him too when bad news is arrived. Daddy never comes to visit them. Halime guesses that her husband is dead or arrested, yet she never lets her daughter to know. Elif is prepared for her father’s possible visit with the same enthusiasm.

Elif doesn’t know the outer world. She realizes the world from the barred windows of the prison vehicle while going to court or hospital; and from the TV screen while walking down the corridor where guards watch it.

Elif’s father doesn’t come to the last meeting. The worst is; when her mother goes to the infirmary, the guard locks her alone in the room. She fears much, cries and screams, and gets exhausted.

Meanwhile, a hole is opened at the wall of the cell bringing light and air from the outside into the narrow, stufy room.

In the hole, a propeller appears and works like a cinema machine. The propeller brings her fresh air and views from the outer world. She gets images, frame by frame to her dark box from the fcttous flm machine.  Overwhelmed by her father’s longing, for her mother’s illness, the strict behavior of the guard, poor Elif plays games with her friends in her own imaginaton and watches the outer world.

‘Elif’s silent scream is the voice of thousands of captve children’.