Sufism Flows Onto Silver Screen

By Amrit Gangar - Daily News & Analysis - Mumbai, India; Friday, January 4, 2008

The year 2007 may not have ended on a pleasant note for the subcontinent, at least not how the great Sufi poet Maulana Jalaluddin Rumi would have envisaged.

In the wake of recent terrorist activity, Rumi’s words on tolerance and love hold special significance today.

To mark the 800th birth anniversary of the poet-philosopher, Unesco had declared 2007 as International Year of Rumi.

Taking the celebration of universal Sufism that Rumi professed a step further, an international film festival capturing the essence and the message of the Sufis will be organised in the city [Mumbai] on Saturday, January 5.

The festival showcases films influenced by the Sufi treatise from across the globe. Take for instance Tina Petrova’s Rumi - Turning Ecstatic (Canada, 2006).

The film tells her story of how she rediscovered life through Rumi after a near-fatal accident. An award-winning actress, Tina is a writer, producer and director.

Originally from Turkey but now teaching at the State University of New York Fredonia, Nefin Dinc’s film I Named Her Angel (Turkey, 2006) follows a 12-year-old girl, Elif, through the course of a year, witnessing her learning the Sema (whirling) dance.

The film won the Special Recognition Award at the Washington DC Independent Film Festival and the Student Award at This Line Film Festival, Texas.

Through her film, Give Me Your Love (Pakistan, 2007) young Nameera Ahmed explores the role music plays in the lives of the Mevlevi Sufis or the whirling dervishes.

They talk of the making and playing of the Ney, a reed flute as a metaphor for the training and transformation of the human spirit.

The film captures the timelessness of the world of Sufis in the contemporary context, where the metaphor still holds power.

[About Nefin Dinc's I Named Her Angel, read also

(click the link, then scroll down) with a comment of the Director ]

[Picture: Mumbai, the National Centre for the Performing Arts. Photo from: http://miffindia.in/]

"Ismini Melek Koydum” (I Named Her Angel)

By Hasan Kanbolat - Today's Zaman - Istanbul, Turkey

Tuesday, August 7, 2007

Nefin Dinç is a young woman devoted to the art of documentary film-making. A documentary she watched during her first year at the School of Political Science at Ankara University had such an immense influence over her that she decided to become a documentary film director.

Her years of apprenticeship on the backstage of the “32nd Day” TV news program were followed by a professional career involving commercials and movies shot in İstanbul, with a master’s degree and a Ph.D. acquired in the United Kingdom and the United States on shooting documentaries.

Every documentary she makes carries traces of Turkish culture and history, often highlighting the modern and humanitarian face of her home country.

The third and latest documentary from Dinç is "Ismini Melek Koydum” (I named her Angel), where she tells the story of a little girl, 12-years-old Elif, who desires to be initiated into the Mevlevi order of whirling dervishes, and focuses on how she learns about the basics and rules of the Sufi order of “Mevleviyya.”

It is a 30-minute documentary which hints at the strong sense of humanism in Anatolian history and culture.

The camera follows Elif for a year, showing the viewer how the whirling ceremony is performed and what it means, the teachings of Mevlana Jelaluddin Rumi, the founder of the order, the meaning of the ceremonies held every December to commemorate him, what the special outfit of a whirling dervish symbolize and how and why foreigners follow and endeavor to internalize his teachings.

The documentary, screened at many foreign festivals, was also screened in Turkey at the “İstanbul 1001 International Documentary Films.”

Nefin Dinç has won deserved fame in the United States with “I named her Angel,” as well as receiving the Special Recognition Award in the world cinema category at the Washington, D.C., Independent Film Festival. Dinç’s acclaimed documentary was screened by national US TV channels many times and attracted the media’s attention.

The documentary now takes on a higher significance given that it has coincided with the 800th anniversary of the birth of the internationally renowned Sufi scholar and poet Mevlana Rumi, with UNESCO also declaring 2007 the “Year of Rumi” to honor the occasion.

Director Dinç is currently working on a new documentary film on Turkey and Greece. It is focused on how Turks and Greeks have developed the present impressions they have of one another. It will be finished in 2008.

[picture from Tiburon International Film Festival http://tinyurl.com/ysakxb]

"İsmini Melek Koydum" awarded

Today's Zaman - Istanbul, Turkey
Friday, April 6, 2007

Turkish filmmaker awarded at US festival

New York-based Turkish director Nefin Dinç has received a Special Recognition Award in the World Cinema category for her documentary titled "İsmini Melek Koydum" (I Named Her Angel) at the 9th DC Independent Film Festival (DCIFF).

The 30-minute documentary centers on a 12-year-old Turkish girl named Elif, who learns about the basics of the Mevlevi order, a Sufi path founded by the Sufi saint and philosopher Mevlana Jelaluddin Rumi in the 13th century.

The 2005 production was previously screened at the International Istanbul 1001 Documentary Film Festival in 2006 in addition to a number of film festivals abroad.

"İsmini Melek Koydum" explores the teachings of Mevlana, the depth of the ceremonies commemorating Mevlana's passing (Şeb-i Arus, Mevlana's reunion with God) and the spiritual aspect of Islam from the perspective of a 12-year-old.

Dinç started documentary filmmaking in 1999 with "Cumhuriyet Treni" (The Republic Train) and her second production was "Rebetiko: İki Şehrin Şarkısı" (Rebetiko: The Song of Two Cities).

The DCIFF was held March 1-11 in Washington, D.C.