Basri is a lonely widower and station employee managing the railroad passing through Anatolia. He spends his days waiting for news of his son Seyfi, whom he placed a State petition to search for after he went missing in prison 18 years earlier. For a father on a mission to find his son, there’s nothing more to lose. The 10-minute, single shot confrontation with a policeman at the beginning of the film is a key scene that highlights Basri’s painful past while visually conveying the film’s theme; the prolonged silence in the last shot is a reminder of political oppression and its victims. Turkey’s preeminent actor Ercan Kesal gives an outstanding performance in this winner of the 2012 Venice Film Festival Lion of the Future for Best First Film. (RHEE Soue-won)