40+ Good Turkish Movies & Shows to Watch

Big Mistakes

When a petty theft leads to a never-ending list of favors the leads have to fulfill for a gangster, this…

Young Sherlock

Young Sherlock isn’t quite accurate to the Andrew Lane book series or the original works from Arthur Conan Doyle. Here,…

Souleymane’s Story

Dir. Boris Lojkine

What is Souleymane’s Story? Right off the bat, that’s what everyone asks from Souleymane. It’s what his fellow immigrant asks,…

Kübra

Saints used to be given divine messages, but in the modern age, what if God, or any higher power, communicated…

A Round of Applause

Dir. Berkun Oya

A Round of Applause is just so darn weird. We’ve seen stories about people remembering their past lives, but we’ve…

About Dry Grasses

Dir. Nuri Bilge Ceylan

Given the controversial subject matter, there’s something remarkably placid about the way About Dry Grasses proceeds. Amidst the snowy white…

Search

Dir. Emin Alper

After a healing workshop leads her best friend to sell her belongings and move to a remote island, Nisan becomes…

Who Were We Running From?

Fear and paranoia are the hallmarks of plenty of thriller series, but Who Were We Running From? takes this paranoia…

The Forty-Year-Old Version

Dir. Radha Blank

This fun comedy-drama is about a New York playwright called Radha who never hit big. When she turns 40, she…

A Regular Woman

Dir. Sherry Hormann

Dramatizing the murder of Hatun “Aynur” Sürücü, A Regular Woman frames her story from her dispassionate narration after she’s passed.…

Rise of Empires: Ottoman

This historical show with immaculate production value is about the fall of Constantinople in 1453. It’s fully in English, despite…

Midnight Traveler

Dir. Hassan Fazili

Hassan Fazili and Nargis Fazili are two filmmakers who, faced with death threats, escape their home in Afghanistan and start…

The Wild Pear Tree

Dir. Nuri Bilge Ceylan

The Wild Pear Tree is somewhat like a novel made into a movie– It’s long, it’s philosophical, and it’s mostly…

Crossing

Dir. Levan Akin

On paper, Crossing’s premise reads like a movie about two different people forging an unlikely but sweet bond. Lia is…

Kedi

Dir. Ceyda Torun

With its detailed portraits of seven of Istanbul’s most adored felines, Kedi affirms what anyone who’s spent some time with…

Don’t Let Them Shoot the Kite

Dir. Tunç Başaran

Originally a novel inspired by real life incarceration, Don’t Let Them Shoot the Kite is actually much more optimistic than…

Actress

Dir. Soner Caner

Yasemin Derin is one of Turkey’s most famous actresses. But when she’s not onscreen or walking the red carpet, she’s…

Human Flow

Dir. Ai Weiwei & Weiwei Ai

Chinese artist Ai Weiwei directs his attention towards the ongoing refugee crisis, the biggest displacement of people since World War…

Marshland

Dir. Alberto Rodríguez

When a regime falls, what follows isn’t a clean slate– it lingers, and it haunts those that were able to…

Djam

Dir. Tony Gatlif

This international comedy-drama in French, Greek, and Turkish is about a free-spirited Greek girl who travels to Istanbul on a…

Short Sharp Shock

Dir. Fatih Akin

Look, Short Sharp Shock is standard crime thriller stuff. The plot has been done before– an ex-convict trying to keep…

Mustang

Dir. Deniz Gamze Ergüven & Female director

Five orphaned sisters are put under house arrest by their uncle and grandmother after they are seen horsing around with…

Only Lovers Left Alive

Dir. Jim Jarmusch

Jim Jarmusch’s latest film is the story of a pair of vampires, Adam and Eve (Tom Hiddleston and Tilda Swinton),…

Creature

Dir. Çağan Irmak

“This is a work of fantasy but to fantasize is to be human.” This quote is placed at the beginning…

The Edge of Heaven

Dir. Fatih Akin

This is a hard movie to describe, but I’ll do my best without giving too much away. The movie takes…

Wolf

Dir. Jim Taihuttu

Look, Wolf has a familiar, even cliché, plot. The idea of having a lead wanting to shift their life around…

Welcome

Dir. Philippe Lioret

A Kurdish-Iraqi immigrant runs into serious immigration problems as he tries to immigrate from France to England in order to…

Stray

Dir. Elizabeth Lo

Beautifully directed and blessed to be led by the wonderfully gentle and curious dog Zeytin, Stray commits to its unique…

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy

Dir. Tomas Alfredson

A slow-burning spy thriller set within the British intelligence service during the height of the Cold War, this complex drama…