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Logline

Esra, a 19-year-old hotel housekeeper, finds the warmth of family she lacks in a fraud gang and will do everything she can to keep the gang from falling apart.

Synopsis

Working as a housekeeper in a hotel in Istanbul, 19-year-old Esra dreams of a life of wealth and luxury. Living with her depressed mother and overbearing stepfather, she has no means to achieve her dreams. Her life takes an unexpected turn when she meets Selma, a warm-hearted young woman full of energy who lives in the hotel where Esra works. She convinces Esra to join a gang of swindlers who travel from town to town arranging fake marriages and making off with the dowry. Esra escapes her neglectful mother’s home and travels south with this gang.

She successfully completes her con jobs and becomes gang’s favorite. She develops a close friendship with Selma; they share a similar enthusiasm and angst towards life. They increasingly resemble a happy family. Despite the guilt she sometimes feels towards the grooms, Esra’s determined not to return home and to achieve the life she has dreamed of.

Esra realizes that she’s part of a larger organization when one day two shady men arrive and threaten their mother-figure, Yıldız. She simultaneously realizes that Selma has an affair with Halil and that they’re planning to elope. Esra, tortured by the very thought of losing her friend, informs Yıldız about Selma’s plans to run away. But Yıldız lets the two lovers escape. Moreover she offers Esra some money so that she may escape and free herself of this perilous life. Esra doesn’t want to break away, but at Yıldız’s insistence, she gets out of the car.

Esra walks alone along a highway. She suddenly collapses. She wakes up in a hospital and takes the bus to Istanbul on her own. As she returns to her old life, starts working as a dishwasher in a factory. Later, however, Yıldız and Esra meet at a hotel to look for new talents.
 

Meet the Filmmakers

Nazli Elif Durlu — Director/Writer
Born in Ankara, Turkey. She studied Film and TV in the Netherlands and got her masters degree from the University of Utrecht. After working in the Netherlands and then in Los Angeles as a screenwriter, she returned to Turkey in 2009. She has written and directed three short films [Trust Me (2009), Later (2012), The Horse and the Nightingale (2013)] that were screened and awarded by various national and international film festivals. In 2010 she worked as one of the screenwriters of the omnibus called Do Not Forget Me Istanbul, in which Hany Abu Assad shot the story she wrote. Since then she has been working as a screenwriter for TV series and feature films. She also teaches film reading and short film production at the Istanbul Bilgi University. Her debut feature film as a writer-director ZUHAL, premiered in the Antalya Film Festival (awarded with Best Actress) and Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival. MUTLU BİR YUVA / 100 THOUSAND TURKISH LIRAS is her second feature film as a writer-director.

Anna Maria Aslanoglu — Producer
She holds BA in political science, MA in history. She worked as an assistant in various short and feature, fiction and non-fiction films. Producer of Ela and Hilmi with Ali (dir. Ziya Demirel, Istanbul FF 2022), Zuhal (dir. Nazlı Elif Durlu, Tallinn Black Nights FF 2021), Phases of Matter (dir. Deniz Tortum, IFFR 2020), Yuva (dir. Emre Yeksan, Venice Biennale College Cinema 2018), Körfez (dir. Emre Yeksan, Venice Critics’ Week 2017) and Tuesday (dir. Ziya Demirel, Cannes FF Official 2015); co-producer of Elbow (dir: Aslı Özarslan, Berlinale Generation 2024), line producer of Crossing (dir. Levan Akin, Berlinale Panorama 2024). She’s among the founders of istos publishing and film, founded in 2012 in Istanbul, focused on producing films, publishing books and organizing cultural events. Member of the EAVE network. She also focuses on production services and production consultancy alongside producing. 

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Contact

For inquiries, please contact fiscalsponsorship@filmindependent.org.