The Call

For 20 years Habib lived in Istanbul with his family, one of thousands whose villages were destroyed in the Turkish army’s attempt to suppress Kurdish resistance. But seven years ago, Habib returned to his native village of Bakolini to work as a goatherd. When his family chose to remain in the city, Habib started a new one, but he is still hoping that his son Ramazan, now an adult, will leave Istanbul and come help him run the farm. Director Reber Dosky was born in Kurdish Iraq and has been living in the Netherlands for the past 15 years. In this graduation film from the Netherlands Film and Television Academy, Dosky carefully observes Habib’s everyday village life, capturing its essence in telling scenes. We see Habib clambering onto the roof of his adobe house to get enough cell reception to call his son Ramazan, and plodding through the mud among the farm’s dozens of goats. As the film progresses, the kew birds that Habib catches in wooden cages come to symbolize a paternal longing for the return of his son to the land of his ancestors. Will he manage to persuade the city boy to come back to his historical home?