Zenne Dancer / Zenne

“Zenne” is the term for male belly dancers, tolerated by Turkish conservative society only with a self-repressing smirk. Can is also a zenne (and a fortune teller by day) who has at least his mother and sister’s support. His friend Ahmet is not so lucky and has to painstakingly hide his sexual orientation. Ahmet meets the German PTSD war photographer Daniel, who is just beginning to discover Middle-East culture…This groundbreaking award-winning film is based on a true event: the tragic death of Ahmet Yildiz, who in 2008 was murdered at the age of twenty-six by his father for being gay. Visually refined and accompanied by a superb score, Caner Alper’s debut is not a straight-forward human-rights impeachment; instead, it offers a portrait of self-ironic outsiders dealing with family, machismo and army duty, which has to be avoided – even at the cost of contributing to the gigantic porn collection of the committee, which requires “documentation” of the militarily exempt’s sexual life.