Kuma

Umut Dağ (2012)

Austria

Kuma is the story of two women and a large family from Anatolia, based in Vienna. The film opens with a wedding in Anatolia, showing the 19-year-old Ayse getting married to Hasan. When she arrives with her husband in Vienna it transpires that she has actually been married to his father, Mustafa, and is now his 'kuma' or second wife. His first wife, Fatma, a woman in her fifites and mother of six children has been diagnosed with cancer and has arranged the marriage so that Ayse would act as surrogate mother and wife while she is undergoing treatment. The children in the family, several of whom are close in age to Ayse, do not accept the second wife while the younger ones don't know what to make of her. Then Ayse gives birth to her first child and relationships become more amicable. 

Umut Dag's feature film was co-written by Petra Ladinigg, one of the almuni of BABYLON Europe (2009). Gareth Jones, who is a member of the Research Network Migrant and Diasporic Cinema in Contemporary Europe, founded the audiovisual development programme BABYLON Europe in 2007 (and subsequently BABYLON International) with the aim to assist filmmakers of culturally diverse origin to break through into the international mainstream and has been particularly committed to supporting and developing scripts and films engaging with migrant and diasporic themes. Kuma was produced by Wega-Films (an Austrian company that also produced several of Michael Haneke's films), opened the Panorma section of the International Film Festival in Berlin in 2012 and has already been sold to 15 territories.

Kuma was widely reviewed in the Austrian press, including in Kurier and Kleine Zeitung. The film has been particularly successful in France, where it was released with 60 copies under the title La seconde femme and widely reviewed in the French press, including in Le Monde 

Posted by Daniela Berghahn on 20 Mar 2013 •

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