Women's Ward

The film is adapted from Kemal Tahir’s own memories. The writer spent three months in Malatya prison in 1943. At the centre of the story is a writer standing in for him. The man is a political prisoner. Both inmates and guards treat him with respect. The prison also has a women’s ward. Two women’s stories are told there. One of them is Tözey. She is a well known figure in the Malatya brothel. The other is Hanım Kuzu. She has been sentenced to death for poisoning her husband together with her young lover. The story weaves their two lives into the writer’s recollections. Turkey as it was then becomes visible through it. The film won best film at Antalya. Kadir İnanır and Hülya Koçyiğit appear in the hundred and forty six minute film, a Turkish production Halit Refiğ finished in 1990.