TURKISH Cypriot director Mahmut Akay’s short film ‘We’re Home’, about the Turkish-speaking community in the UK, was nominated for the ‘Best Documentary’ for the Oscar-qualified İzmir film festival.
Successful director Mahmut Akay, who has achieved significant success abroad, has attracted attention with his work titled ‘We’re Home’, with the symbolic destruction of the Turkish-speaking demographic, which has a large population in the UK. The short film traverses a jumble of Turkish-speaking people living in the UK, capturing the diversity and reflections on their invisibility in the media.
Despite the short films recent release, it has already been awarded the prestigious Vimeo Staff Pick award. According to a statement made by Mahmut Akay on his social media page this week, “Our film We’re Home has been nominated for the ‘Best Documentary’ for the Oscar-qualifying film festival.”
London-born director Mahmut Akay has worked with brands such as Vogue, David Beckham and Wall’s Ice Cream. His movies have been featured in magazines like The Hollywood Reporter, Yahoo, The A.V Club and more.
Akay, who previously made special statements about his short film ‘We’re Home’ to the Londra Gazete, spoke as follows:
“We’re Here’ was born out of my disenchantment with the British media’s under-representation of the Turkish demographic in the United Kingdom. There’s estimated to be over 700,000 Turkish speaking Brits, yet we seldom see anything about them on the media. If we’re lucky enough see them, then chances are it will probably be about kebab restaurants. The problem with this symbolic annihilation is that it permeates into other areas such as a lack of job opportunities, stereotyping and prejudice. It’s not just about the spotlight but it’s an all-encompassing issue.’’