Watch two brave Turkish warriors fight for the future of the Earth with cardboard swords and a whole lot of kung-fu.
To follow up on my entry from September 17th entitled I am rendered speechless. Don't mind the comment someone left for me on there... it was obviously someone I knew trying to play a trick on me.
Turkish Star Wars starring Cuneyt Arkin doesn't necessarily live up to its name. I happened upon a subtitled copy of the Turkish masterpiece on ebay. Needless to say, this is one of the coolest things I bought on ebay other than the lot of 35 80's records for $10 (which included two vinyl copies of J. Geils Band's Centerfold bringing the number of this particular record in my posession to 3). I am now the proud owner of one of the only subtitled copies of Turkish Star Wars, and I was just a bit disappointed. But first things first.
Who is Cuneyt Arkin? I looked him up on IMDB and discovered he appeared in 225 films and television shows in a span of 40 years. The guy must be about 80 years old by now. In Turkish STar Wars he looked to be about 40 and that was "filmed" in 1982. Whether or not any softcore porn films are in his resume is unknown, unless you're willing to translate all the titles from Turkish into English. I don't know what prevents me from thinking Turkish Star Wars is just a softcore porn with all the crypto-penetration cut out, other than the fact that the movie would be 3 hours log WITH the crypto-penetration. All porn conspiracy theories aside...
Turkish Star Wars real title is "Dunyayi Kurtaran Adam" or "The Man Who Saves The World". Contrary to the English Translation of "Turkish Star Wars" the film is not a retelling of Star Wars. Most Americans who saw the original must have assumed it was a ripoff because of the myriad stolen footage. For example at the beginning of the film, a narrator tells the backstory while scenes from Episode 4 are cycled about 5 times.
The story is really about Earth in the future, which doesn't mean "a long time ago in a galaxy far far away" and several wars have wiped out most of humanity. Some alien race tried to destroy Earth but failed, because of something that had to do with the human brain. Some alien (Darth Vader) plans to steal some human brains and eat them so he can get a better understanding. A space battle takes place between the bad guys (designated as X-Wings) and the good guys (designated as Tie Fighers). By this time the viewer begins to sense that maybe the footage was just stolen for the effect and not the story.
I was beginning to believe that the only thing that was ripped off was the Star Wars footage but I was wrong. Throughout the movie, the score from Raiders of the Lost Ark is played. During a montage preparation scene, a techno mix of the Battlestar Galactica theme is played. During one climactic scene music from the old Disney flick Black Hole was played. I was actually kind of impressed that someone managed to dig up the Black Hole soundtrack, and I bet you're all impressed that I recognized the Black Hole soundtrack.
One scene that remaines imprinted in my mind is the cantina scene. Yes, the same cantina from Star Wars, only the footage of the creatures was interspersed with some of the Turks own creations. I think I even saw a Turkish Tuscan Raider.
The rest of the film is just a bunch of guys in hairy costumes reminiscent of Sigmund and the Sea Monsters and other Sid and Marty Krofft creations. I suggest reading the Wave article featuring the Turkish creation.
My next mission is to obtain a (hopefully subtitled) veresion of Turkish E.T. and to see if the ripoff quality rivals that of Mac And Me. That's a rant for another day.
Coming soon... How The Returner rips off: E.T.
The Matrix
The Professional
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