This tale of friendship and courage tracks a politically naive man′s initiation into the social realities of contemporary Turkey. When Mehmet is mistakenly identified as a Kurd by the Istanbul police, his dreams of a better life in the big city are destroyed. Pushed to the margins of Turkish society, he soon embarks on a harrowing journey eastward across the politically turbulent country of Turkey. This story was inspired by newspaper articles on villages that have been marked, burned and evacuated in the southeastern region of Turkey. In recent years, stories of villagers forced to leave their towns have become quite common in Turkey. Hundreds of Mehmets, Berzans and Arzus are immigrating to Istanbul, trying to find their way to survive in the big metropolis. My sensitivity as both filmmaker and an architect used to observing life in slum neighborhoods pushed me to create Journey to the Sun. I wanted to tell the story of three young people from totally different parts of Turkey who form close friendships. The story is told from Mehmets, perspective, which is closest to my own, which reflects a growing awareness of the social realities in Turkey through a journey from west to east. (Yesim Ustaoglu)