The Collector

The documentary is about an elderly man who has spent seventy years collecting everything one can imagine. The house has filled with his collections and he now lives in his own home like a guest. The camera follows him through the crowded streets of Istanbul as he searches every day for new pieces, and reports without judgement an occupation that looks like an attempt to stop time. The account does not present collecting as an illness or an oddity; it tries to understand how the man sees objects and life. Through its short length of forty six minutes no explanatory voice is brought in from outside. Mithat Esmer appears in Pelin Esmer’s forty six minute Turkish documentary, completed in 2002.