OTTplay at BIFFes: Brother’s Keeper review – A child’s life hangs in the balance in this tale of bureaucracy and apathy

Director Ferit Karahan’s second film is based on his own experiences in a residential school.

A still from the film

Story: When a young boy at a residential school falls sick, his roommate desperately tries to get him medical help. But all he encounters is a bunch of teachers and administrators who play the blame game.

Review: The first thing that strikes you about director Ferit Karahan’s film, Brother’s Keeper, is its setting. A remote residential school for boys in the midst of a snowstorm, where temperatures are wildly below zero and the heating doesn’t work well enough. If not the sight of snow, then that of young boys, clad only in their undies, having to bathe in cold water in this freezing weather is likely to make you feel a chill. Brrrrr!

The school is supposedly for bright Kurdish youngsters, but the way it is run makes you wonder if it was a juvenile detention centre, right from the rationed meals, weekly baths and strict attendance policies, and adherence to discipline, there’s nothing that screams regular academic centre here.

When a 10-year-old child, Memo (Nurullah Alaca) then falls ill and is near comatose after enduring a cold shower punishment, it also becomes crystal clear that the school is ill-equipped to handle the situation. There’s a sickroom with some random medication strewn around and a bed, but no nurse or doctor to run it and an older student doling out aspirin to anyone who is unwell. Memo’s friend and roommate Yusuf (Samet Yildiz) tries valiantly to get him help, but is first met with a bunch of indifferent adults, who fail to see the gravity of the situation because the boy’s not spiking a fever.

And when they eventually realize that Memo does need help, they find themselves snowed in, and with no vehicle equipped to handle such conditions. But more than finding ways to get help, the adults – the principal, teachers and hostel wardens, etc. - are more interested in playing detective to find out who’s responsible for the child’s plight and assign blame.

The story of Brother’s Keeper is inspired by Ferit’s own experiences in a residential school. The stars of this film are Samet Yildiz and Türksoy Gölebeyi’s cinematography and the reveal of the events of the previous night that led to Memo’s ill health.

Verdict: Brother’s Keeper is a grim reminder of institutional apathy among a number of social issues. This is not a happy tale with a lot of tension and a political undertone.

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