| Art Profile |
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Halit Refiğ was born in Izmir in 1934. He attended Sisli Terakki High School and briefly attended Robert College Engineering Department. During his military service, he started making documentaries in Japan, Korea and Sri Lanka with a Super 8 camera. In 1957, he started the Turkish Film Review with film critic Nijat Ozon. Later, Refiğ assisted director Atif Yılmaz in two films. In 1961, Refiğ directed his first feature, "Yasak ask" (1961). His approach to filmmaking was influenced by his friendship with the famous Turkish novelist Kemal Tahir. This collaboration gave fruit to "Four Women in the Harem", which Refiğ scripted and later produced "Yorgun savascı" (1979), the most controversial film ever made in Turkish film history. Refiğ defended it and published a theory of national cinema, which he named "Ulusal Sinema" (national cinema). Later, he revised his theory and called his work "ATUT" (Asiatic Mode of Production) cinema or "Halk Sinemasi" (Cinema of the People). Refiğ compiled his articles on national cinema in a volume Ulusal Sinema Kavgası (Fight for a national Cinema). Refiğ and his colleague, like Metin Erksan and Lutfi Akad, made nationalist films until late 1960s. In 1974, the newly established Turkish Radio and Television Corporation (TRT) commissioned Refiğ to make a literary adaptation of a Turkish novel of his choice. The result was "Ask-i memnu" (1974) (TV) (Forbidden Love), which was hailed as the first Turkish TV mini series. In 1975, Refiğ joined other filmmakers to establish the Turkish Cinema and TV Institute. In 1977, he was invited to teach at University of Wisconsin, where he made a Victorian period drama, Intercessors. In 1979, he was invited once again by the TRT to make "Yorgun Savasci" (Tired Warrior), Kemal Tahir′s controversial novel. The film was later aired in 1992 from a restored 1 inch tape. After this, Refiğ made popular films with Türker Inanoğlu. This gave Refiğ the opportunity to realize his smaller and more personal projects like "Hanım" (Madame). After nearly a decade, Refiğ made "Köpekler adası" (1997) (Island of Dogs). The film received mixed reviews. As a filmmaker, he made over 50 popular and personal films in the Turkish film industry. As a film critic and theoretician, he produced a significant body of film criticism and literally created a theory of national cinema, one that predates the theories of third cinema initiated in Latin American and African countries. Finally, as an intellectual, he practiced what he preached. Refiğ focused on national and cultural identities in the young Turkish Republic, critiquing the westernization and nationalist ideologies in Turkey and favoring the traditional values and the Ottoman past.
Refiğ deconstructed the Republican Kemalist ideology and the position of the Kemalist intellectual in Turkish society, discussed east-west and rural-urban tension in a rapidly changing social environment and the position of women in defining the new Turkish national identity. His work was also influenced by the psychoanalytical work of Freud and Jung′s idea of collective consciousness. Refiğ liked applying a dialectical intellectual montage and German expressionist framing. Halit Refiğ passed away in 2009.
Selected his important films: Şafak Bekçileri (1963), Gurbet Kuşları (1964), Haremde Dört Kadın (1965), Bir Türke Gönül Verdim (1969), Aşk-ı Memnu (TV), Yorgun Savaşçı (TV, Gösterime girmedi), İhtiras Fırtınası (1983), Teyzem (1986), Kurtar Beni (1987).
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