Meteors Film Difficulty Ranking: 4
What bad things happened in 2015? You may remember the Paris attacks, the Charleston Church shootings, or even the picture of the drowned Syrian boy lying face down on the beach. However, you probably didn’t hear about the Turkish crackdown on the Kurdish PKK. It seems like no professional cameramen were there to capture the events. However, just as in Silvered Waters, the public captured it all on their mobile phones.
From: Turkey, AsiaWhy Watch Meteors?
Watch: Trailer
Next: Silvered Water, Ahlaam, The Burmese Harp
- To appreciate life and living in a country where war is not normal (apologies if this doesn’t apply to you)
- For a mad amount of fireworks
- To experience hunting mountain goats and martial law
- Witness some awesome meteors
The Breakdown
In contrast to the rest of the film, Meteors starts in the mountains with a small group of hunters. They’re seeking out mountain goats and have the telescopic sighted rifles to pick them off from a distance. When they sight the first mountain goat, the camera switches to the view from their telescopic rifle sights as they move their gun’s cross-hairs onto their unsuspecting quarry. The goats have no chance.
In the rest of the film, the hunters become the hunted.
It all starts with what looks like some ceremonial celebrations/protests in a large town in Kurdish Turkey. All we see is the footage from phone cameras and small camcorders held by locals. The ceremony/protest is obviously Kurdish, and it looks more and more chaotic as the night progresses with fireworks firing off everywhere.
Following the fireworks, the Turkish forces arrive. They are here to crack down on the Kurdish PKK (the Kurdistan worker’s party) and they’re using the fireworks as a reason to move in.
The result: a town that resembles a war zone. Kids nonchalantly talk about their relatives which have been killed in the last few months as if it’s just part of life. The streets are empty as no one wants to risk getting targeted and shot.
The Meteors
The arrival of the Turkish army coincides with a rare meteor shower in the region. Shooting stars are seen everywhere and meteors slowly burn through the sky. The footage is impressive, especially if you’ve never seen a meteor before. It’s a perfect ending to the film as well. The meteors indicate that there’s something bigger than humanity – it shows that we can be wiped out in an instance. It points out that the war and violence perpetuated by the Turkish army and PKK are ultimately pointless as they could both be wiped out in an instant by nature.
What to Watch Next
The war zone in Meteors reminded me of the war zones of Turkey’s neighbours as depicted in Silvered Water (Syria) and Ahlaam (Iraq). The depictions of war in each of these films is slightly surreal – the destruction is too horrific.
If you would rather see a pacifist film, check out:
- The Burmese Harp – musical Japanese troops fighting a war they do not want in Burma
- Apocalypse Now – an American depiction of the horrific Vietnam War
- The Grave of the Fireflies – a Japanese anime and probably the most powerful anti-war films ever made
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