Who is the 'Man with a Handycam'?
In the wake of the outbreak of the pandemic, a director candidate who has been struggling to survive in the industry becomes unemployed and has to stay at home.
Then, due to boredom, he starts to shoot with an old model handheld camera he bought a few days ago for a project that has now been canceled. What he sees through the window first: Empty roads, buildings, windows, planes, clouds, birds… He does not witness with a murder like Jeff in Rear Window, but sees a burning house, a gunfight and a police operation.
After a while, he can't get enough and he gets himself out of the house. Empty streets, avenues... He witnesses the dystopia, into which Istanbul, a metropolis of 20 million people, fell. As he knocks about the city, he plunges into dreams and paranoia. He wanders illegally, eluding the police, loses the camera, pursues it… With the backlog of images, he sits down like Dziga Vertov, the Man with a Movie Camera’, starts editing.
Time passes, the pandemic ends, life goes back to its normal, people get used to it... But the editing does not end. The agenda changes, the coronavirus is forgotten. He gets lost in the images. Reality and fantasy; documentary and fiction merge, genres intermingle.
And finally, the time comes, the editing ends somehow...
Who am I?
I'm Mete Akbas. The director, producer, screenwriter, cameraman and editor of ‘Man with a Handycam’. I studied cinema at the University of Bologna, Italy and worked as a director, assistant director, editor for a long time. And after about 12 years, I was eventually able to complete a project of mine.
So how and why did I make this movie?
The Coronavirus pandemic has been a period for me, like most people, that I questioned myself. I was trying to survive in Istanbul by working in small and big jobs in this sector. And I felt lost in every sense. I started taking pictures with a handheld camera at home out of boredom. In the beginning, there was nothing clear in my mind. Like a kind of observer, I was filming what I saw, encountered. Without any purpose… After a while, the images started gathering around some kind of narration and I slowly began combining them. Again, without any purpose…
But as I was shooting and editing, I realized how much I enjoyed my work. Over the years, I realized that I had become numb in my working life and that what I really wanted to do was to produce for myself rather than working for someone else.
Well, let’s keep it short. The result was a panorama of the corona presented from a personal perspective. A summary of those days which seem to belong to a distant past, even if it only happened two years ago... And in the background, there is my story, my eyes and my perception...
What do I expect from you?
I carried out all of the stages of this film by myself, from the production to the editing. With your support, I intend to complete the sound and music of the movie, cover production expenses and raise funds for the festival process. But I need your help, not only financially, but also morally. I would also appreciate your assistance in spreading the call by sharing the campaign through your social media accounts.