AYESHA RASCOE, HOST:
Crossing - crossing paths, crossing borders, crossing genders - in Levan Akin's new movie, a woman hopes to make good on a promise she made to her late sister, to bring a prodigal child home. The title of the film is, appropriately, "Crossing," and director Levan Akin joins us now. Welcome to the program.
LEVAN AKIN: Thank you. Thank you for having me.
RASCOE: People may remember your film from 2019, "And Then We Danced." This new movie isn't a sequel, but it does spring from "And Then We Danced," right?
AKIN: Yes, it's in many ways somehow a companion piece to "And Then We Danced." When "And Then We Danced" premiered, you know, there was a lot of turmoil and riots in Georgia, people trying to stop the screening of the film. There was a discourse in Georgia where it was sort of a very polarizing discourse, where it was about the older generation versus the younger generation, the Soviet generation versus the post-Soviet generation. And that was one of the kernels that gave me the idea to this film, to try to tell a story from the perspective of somebody who is an older relative to an LGBTQI person.
RASCOE: In "Crossing," we have Lia looking for Tekla. And the search takes her from her village in Georgia to Istanbul. Here's a clip.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "CROSSING")
MZIA ARABULI: (As Lia, non-English language spoken).
RASCOE: That's Lia and her travel companion Achi, and she's saying, Istanbul seems like a place where people come to disappear. Is that particular to Istanbul, or do you think it's true of, like, any big city?
AKIN: I mean, it's probably true of a lot of these, like, megacities. But Istanbul is a very transient place. With the history of the Turkish Republic and sort of the population exchanges that have been happening throughout Turkey and Istanbul, specifically, it's ever evolving. I think it's quite easy to disappear in Istanbul if you want to.
RASCOE: So, throughout the movie, we get to know the character Tekla without seeing her on screen. Her aunt and friend get to know her through her community where she lived. Why did you decide to go that route?
AKIN: Think it was a decision that grew organically. I never had the intention of telling Tekla's story from her point of view. For me, I was always interested in the sort of relationship aspect and the atonement aspect of the story. But then when I was in Istanbul doing my research, I met several women, and they were all very inspiring in their resilience and in their sort of optimism despite everything. That's why I included the character of Evrim in the film.
RASCOE: What did you want Lia to take from her journey, from her perspective, trying to find her niece?
AKIN: Yeah, I think with Lia, she's sort of almost introduced as like a Wild West-type figure, a woman on mission. I feel very strongly that her mission is she just wants to find Tekla, that she rights a wrong, and then she's done. She says, also at some point in the film, I have no future. This is it, and then I'm done, basically. I think throughout the film, she she sort of rediscovers herself, I would say.
RASCOE: I wanted to ask about the language disclaimer that was included at the beginning of the movie, and it reads both, Georgian and Turkish are gender neutral languages. They make no distinctions of grammatical gender. Why did you feel the need to include that?
AKIN: I felt like it was a translation thing because when they reference Tekla both in Georgian and in Turkish, they're not gendering her. Missgendering someone or gendering them correctly - that has a significance, right? So I think it's important to just include that, like, Lia is not gendering her in the beginning. She's not calling her, her.
RASCOE: One of the leads in the film, Mzia Arabuli, who plays Lia, is actually a well-known Georgian actress from Soviet times. Had your leads actually interacted with the LGBTQ or even the trans community before filming?
AKIN: No, actually, she's from another generation and she's worked with theater her whole life. Of course, she's met people from the community, but not trans people - she hadn't. So we also had people from the community in the film team and her costume assistant, for instance, is a trans girl called Yasmine. For her, it was a journey too, this film, and a very positive one.
RASCOE: It seems like one of the themes from this film is, like, what generations can learn from each other and that generational conversation that you were talking about.
AKIN: Yeah, I guess so, but also just like - you know how people are always like, yeah, he's homophobic, but he's old. He's from a different generation. And I'm like, that's such a basic answer. It doesn't need to be that black and white. Don't use your generation as an excuse, basically. Also to have the conversation that many of us haven't been able to have with that generation or even with our parents for many people. And just like, what would those words sound like is something that I think is important for many of us to hear.
RASCOE: Talked about the protests to "And Then We Danced." Did the reception of that film influence your approach to making this film?
AKIN: I think I was more like bolstered by it, actually, to be honest. Cinema has power. Cinema can change. Images affect people. That was very invigorating to me. That film sort of was an injection into a conversation that needed to be had in Georgia.
RASCOE: You've said that your last film, "And Then We Danced," was a love letter to Georgia. If that was a love letter to Georgia, what is "Crossing" for you?
AKIN: It's many things to me. It's very much conversations that I want to have or have had or, you know, wish what happened between people. And it's also a love letter to Istanbul for sure, and to Turkish music, which I love.
RASCOE: (Laughter) Is there a reason why you wanted to make a love letter to Istanbul?
AKIN: Yeah. I used to go there when I was a kid with my father a lot. We had relatives there, so we used to go through Istanbul and then travel by the Black Sea and then go to Georgia. So I have a relationship to Istanbul.
RASCOE: That's Levan Akin. His new movie is "Crossing." It's in theaters now. Thank you so much for speaking with us.
AKIN: Thank you. What a lovely conversation. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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