Phases of Matter

The professor strides resolutely through the old Istanbul University Cerrahpasa Hospital. She stops next to a patient. Having professionally exchanged some medical data, she interestedly asks the elderly woman on the bed what book she is reading. The professor picks it up and reads a love poem aloud – an unexpected contrast in Deniz Tortum's depiction of the parallel world of doctors and other workers in the hospital where he was born and where his father is a doctor. A human, curious look at a place where life and death, levity and severity, poetry and confrontation go side by side. Roaming freely, the observational style of this documentary flows into more free-spirited impressions, including of medical equipment, preserved body parts, medical dummies and a comforting reflection from the imam of the mortuary. The ancient hospital itself heightens further the growing sense of impermanence. It is also under threat of demolition. (International Film Festival Rotterdam)