About Dry Grasses (2023) (Criterion Collection)

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The latest existential epic from Turkish director Nuri Bilge Ceylan is a masterclass in characterization, atmosphere, and moral and philosophical inquiry. When he comes under scrutiny for misconduct, cynical middle-school instructor Samet (Deniz Celiloglu) fears that his punishment will trap him in the snowy, isolated Anatolian village he has grown to despise. The only ray of hope is his relationship with Nuray (Merve Dizdar, who won Best Actress at the Cannes Film Festival), a fellow teacher who openly challenges Samet's bitter narcissism yet Samet's friendship with his colleague and roommate, Kenan (Musab Ekici), who also has feelings for Nuray, hangs in the balance. Using hypnotic long takes and other bold formal techniques to convey the murky motives of it's Dostoevskian protagonist, About Dry Grasses proves Ceylan to be one of cinema's most incisive investigators of the human condition.