In Limbo

Directed by Harun Güler

We’ve been following Harun Güler’s work across his prolific career as a film director. His latest work IN LIMBO is a collaboration between GAP, Zalando and NOWNESS to celebrate pride - and we are here for it! Challenging Middle Eastern conventions and stereotypes, IN LIMBO features a series of intimate vignettes of taboo-breaking personalities from Istanbul free from clichés and expectations.

Let talk to Güler to learn more about it.

Your work explores aspects of Turkish culture through a contemporary lens. What would you say have been the main factors in your life which have encouraged you to explore this through filmmaking?

I always like to give the viewer the unexpected and not what they want to see or hear. When it comes to Middle Eastern elements, I feel even more responsible to not fall into a trap of reproducing orientalist images. So yes, I wanted to break and reshape the notion of Middle Eastern conventions and stereotypes, especially from a Western perspective. At the same time I wanted to give the talents a platform in which they could express themselves to the Turkish audience in an unfiltered way.

What we love about IN LIMBO is the subversion of stereotypes and expectations. As expressed by the title, you are leaving the viewer in a limbo of uncertainty, in which the people and stories we are presented with don’t fit a mainstream narrative. The way you do this is by combining documentary and fiction, which allows you a certain element of control over how the story is told. Would you say this approach defines your current style? Or would you say this is what we are heading towards in terms of video content?

Using documentary and fictional elements at the same time has always been something I experimented with in my previous work. With IN LIMBO I wanted to go a step further and position the whole narrative in between documentary and fiction. In the end the viewer might not exactly know what elements in the film are real and what are not. I like to keep them in this state of uncertainty as I believe it is not relevant in order to feel the personalities and their moments.

I don’t know if video content in general is heading towards this direction, but for me I can say that I feel very comfortable positioning my work between reality and fiction.

IN LIMBO is a collaboration with NOWNESS, Gap and Zalando - we’d love to learn more about it! How did it come about?

GAP and Zalando were looking for filmmakers to fund their next films as part of their Pride campaign. Luckily IN LIMBO was one of them. It’s rare to work for commissioned projects and have such a creative freedom from pitching process to finalisation. I can clearly say that the final output is a Director’s Cut.

“In the end the viewer might not exactly know what elements in the film are real and what are not. I like to keep them in this state of uncertainty as I believe it is not relevant in order to feel the personalities and their moments.”

The casting plays a key role in the film, especially because as we all know the stories we tell, in order to be compelling, have to be authentic. What was the casting process like? And how easy was it to direct the talent and illustrate your concept.

The casting process was a mixture of different approaches actually. With Özgür Uzay and Meli Bendeli we got in touch through their casting agencies. With Akış Ka and Must KiKa I was connected through Instagram for a long time. I was so happy when they were all on board!

The idea for each vignette was created individually based on the talent’s backgrounds and their input. During the production process it was important for me that each of them feel comfortable with how they were depicted. In the end I can say it was an amazing experience for all of us.

What was the most challenging aspect of the production? And how did you overcome it?

Since we were juggling between a documentary and fictional approach we did not prepare the shoot days where everything was fixed and decided, but always needed to leave some room for experimentation and space for each talent to be spontaneous and authentic in that very moment. But once every person in the crew understood what we were after it started to flow pretty well.

What are you working on next?

Besides commissioned projects I’ve been working on my own medium length film project which I hope to shoot some time next year.

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Director: Harun Güler

Starring: Akış Ka, Must & KiKA, ÖzgürUzay, Meli Bendeli

Production Company: 212 Studio, Sting Berlin

Executive Producers: Handan Yilmaz, Divina Kuan

Producer: Özlem Seçkiner

Director of Photography: Leander Ott

Music: TI:ME:CO:DE, eeph

Editor: Vigdís Erla, Harun Güler

Colorist: Delfina Mayer

Casting: Middle-East's Gamechanger

Stylist: Kaner Kivanc 

Styling Assistants: Dilara Vural, Furkan Çelik

Make Up Advisor: Serkan Parmaksızoğlu / KLAN,

Hair Artist: Ahmet Çepel

Body Painter: Ahu Aydemir Yüksel

Poem written by Irem Aydin

Vocal Performance: Harun Güler

Production Manager: Aşkın Kal

Production Assistant: Çağsu Yıldız

1st AD: Suhan alettayin

Focus Puller: Yasin Akın

2nd AC: Arif C. Koca & Umut Can Sarıkaya

Underwater Cam Operator: Akın Bağcılar

Steadicam Operator: Tolga Dural

DIT: Zeliha Akcakaya 

Gaffer: Mustafa Aktaş

Best Boy: Özgür Çakar

Technician: Enes Karagöz

Key Grip: Cem Tanışman

Graphic Designer: Sascha_Anton

Sound Design & Mix: TI:ME:CO:DE

VFX Artist: Dogus Aslan

Talents: Mert Eren Cenker, Serhat Şamil Dağıstanlı, Can Özçöllü, Ömer Salih Aydoğan, Yahya Çelebi

Supported by GAP and Zalando

Special thanks to Joe Timbs, Robinson Meinecke