Crossroads (1970) and the origin of Islamic Cinema in Turkey

Abstract

This article focuses on Birlesen Yollar/Crossroads (Yucel cakmakli 1970) which pioneered the Islamic National Cinema Movement in Turkey. The film discursively constructed Turkish secularist modernization as cosmetic Westernization and promoted the Islamic way of life as the only means to true happiness-a popular theme of Islamic cinema in the late 1980s and 1990s. Although the film-makers discursively posited it as an 'alternative' film they followed the narrative conventions of melodrama the most popular genre of the time. Moreover they worked with famous mainstream stars. In other words the film-makers chose to communicate the then marginal message of Islamism by reconfiguring and Islamicizing the mainstream rather than rejecting it all together. In this respect Crossroads was an early example of the Islamist project to Islamicize modernity in Turkey that would gain momentum in the 1990s. The article attempts to reconstruct the film's historical and continuing significance by locating it within a broader discursive context and by exploring its historical development from its production through to its passage through censorship and public reception. The article also discusses the continuities between the film's discourse and current debates on secularism and Islamism in Turkey.