A thrilling documentary directed and produced by Dr Eylem Atakav, tackles the stories of child brides in Turkey recollecting their memories as adults. It explores what happens after child marriage by focusing on the stories of four women, and making their experiences visible, while contributing to debates around this significant, complex and emotionally charged human rights issue which has often been discursively silenced. Featured on NY Times, the documentary is described as a projector of child brides in Turkey.
“Growing Up Married, which will premiere in London on Oct. 30, examines the impact of child marriage on four women who were wed as teenagers in western Turkey.
“When hearing some of their stories I thought to myself ‘how are you still alive?’,” filmmaker Eylem Atakav said in an interview with the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
Globally, one third of girls in developing countries, excluding China, are married before the age of 18 and one in nine before the age of 15, according to U.N. data.
Child marriage robs girls of their childhood and education and increases the risk of domestic violence and sexual abuse, campaigners say.
It also puts them in danger of death or serious injury if they have children before their bodies are ready.”
The women in the film, now in their 30s to 50s, were married between the ages of 14 and 17.
“They put a wedding gown on me one night and took me to some place I had never seen before – I (have) remained silent ever since,” one of the women says in the film.
Another describes how she used to dread night-time because her husband would drag her to the bedroom where he “took pleasure out of pulling my hair”.
“I used to collect all my hair from the floor and pillows every morning. Then I started cutting my hair so that he couldn’t hurt me as much.”
Atakav said the film also revealed more “insidious” forms of abuse.
“Tradition in Turkey dictates that the bride should be a virgin, before she has sex with her husband on the night of the wedding,” she explained.
“Family members wait outside the bedroom to then note the blood on the white sheet in the morning.”
Atakav said that one of the women in the film who was married at 15 was accused of not being a virgin when her family couldn’t see any blood.
“Her husband shouted at the family ‘you bought me a woman, not a girl!’.” The woman said she was taken to another village for a virginity test and that “life after that was awful”.
