Berlin 2011 Review: Our Grand Despair

rating: 3.5

It's hard enough as it is getting up early each morning for the earliest screenings - and in the Berlin cold - without the knowledge that the first film of the day has the dispiriting English title Our Grand Despair. Turkish competition entrant Bizim Buyuk Caresizligimiz, which follows a girl whose parents have recently perished in a car crash, could have been a truly harrowing start to the day were the title taken to its most literal extreme. Instead it turned out to be the opposite: a warm and funny film about friendship and love - bittersweet perhaps, but not at all depressing. Surprisingly the title does not really refer to the grief of the young girl, Nihal (Gunes Sayin), who overcomes her sadness - at least on the surface - fairly early on. Instead it is about the lighter and more comedy-friendly - though no less real - despair of two men, named Ender (Ilker Aksum) and Cetin (Fatih Al). They take her into their home in Ankara - an almost Western European kind of Turkish city - at the behest of her grieving older brother, who lives far away in Germany. The trouble is that both men start to fall in love with her and it is clear that it is love too, rather than lust or infatuation, which can be seen in the tender and respectful way they speak of her. This is tempered by the knowledge that nothing could ever happen in good conscience, due to the Nihal's age, their friendship with her brother and their friendship with each other. There is also the question of the power imbalance between them (the men are effectively her guardians) as well as her vulnerable emotional state. Therefore the film is less about whether they can have her and more about the pain of dealing with a love you can neither fulfil nor even properly express. This is something we have probably all felt at one time or another in our lives and so it's a pretty touching type of very personal "despair" to deal with. You empathise with the duo all the more because they are such good-natured and amiable characters. The most common complaint I've heard here among critics I've spoken to here is that the film is a little too light and insubstantial for its own good, with the central themes explored with comedy rather than intense drama. Yet I found this good humour to be the film's strongest suit as it follows two inseparable lifelong best friends, the type of relationship we now call a "bromance". The levity makes their friendship seem all the more recognisable and authentic, as does the lack of the typical second act in which they fall out due to misunderstanding or petulance. The dynamic between these two is the heart of the film, as they bicker, sing and dance together and their relationship akin to that of lovers. Ender admits to Nihal that he has tried to find Cetin in the women he meets but has not had the luck, saying that he misses his friend when they are apart and that when they separate they call each other every day. It's enjoyable and sweet, though not likely a film that will live long in the memory. Neither, I suspect, will it find much of an audience outside of its native Turkey. But it is certainly nothing to despair over.