Doktor Civanım

Kartal Tibet's 1983 film is one of the works that moved the Kemal Sunal comedy template to the village. Kemal writes to his mother telling her he has become a doctor; when she spreads the news through the village, his return becomes a major event and the young women compete to win him. The lie growing beyond control is the engine of the comedy. The technical limits of a production from Yeşilçam's final years are obvious: sound, editing and crowd scenes are perfunctory. What is interesting now is the underlying subject, a young man who has migrated to the city and cannot tell his family the truth; beneath the comic template sits a concrete social reality of the period. Sunal's playing carries the film as always. Who it's for: viewers interested in Kemal Sunal comedies and 1980s Yeşilçam production. Who it's not for: anyone expecting technical competence, or troubled by the period's treatment of women characters.