Pursuit of identity in Islamic cinema movement in Turkey (1989-1994)

In the 1990s, the Islamic Cinema Movement has been living the brightest period and has produced its most popular works. Nevertheless, it has been left to be forgotten in the academic community as much as it is in the Turkish cinema circles due to its marginal stance. However, the Islamic Cinema Movement believes that cinema reflects the social spirit as well as influences the society and performs a considerable function in transmitting messages. The movement produced thesis films that actually generated with socio-cultural consciousness. In terms of artistic manner, the Islamic Cinema Movement is often criticized for its flawed structure, didactic and manifastative style and that is why the movement has been lost its sociological essence among these debates. It is the primary aim of this study to make the Islamic cinema as a subject of a scientific work while 'understand' and 'interpret' it with a scientific vision and methods. To this aim, the following questions are asked in this study: What is the Islamic cinema that becomes an agenda as a continuation of the national cinema? What are the conditions that generates the Islamic cinema? How can these Islamic films which set a revenue records and hit the top during 90s be explained? What are the focus of criticism directed towards the Islamic cinema? What are the main themes in Islamic cinema films, and what are the messages to be given on these themes? What are the dimensions of Islamic cinema films making their identity emphasis? In order to answer these questions, starting from the sociology-cinema and basis of identity relations, it has been benefited from the literature survey on Islamic cinema as well as the film analyzes which constitue the applicable part of this study. This study is baed on a qualitative research design with a hermeneutical understanding in the light of the interpretive social science approach. There are nine Islamic films selected with the purposeful sampling technique using multiple case study strategy were analyzed from the viewpoint of the diagnostic critique. As a result of the analysis carried out in this direction, there are three main themes that stand out in the Islamic cinema films; Westernization/Modernization, Confrontation with the Past and Headscarf. The identity emphasis in the movies is linked to common themes that made different viewpoints of identity as 'me and other', 'self-awareness', 'identity crisis.' It can be asserted that the findings obtained in this study allow Islamic cinema to be understand versatile and re-evaluated with a new perspective. Keywords: Cinema, Identity, Islamic Cinema, National Cinema, Movie Critique