Dünyayı Kurtaran Adam


Title: Dünyayı Kurtaran Adam (The Man Who Saved the Earth)
Also known as: Turkish Star Wars
Rating: 3.5/5
Genre: Action, Sci-Fi, Adventure (Comedy)
Starring: Cüneyt Arkin, Aytekin Akkaya
Director: Çetin Inanç
Language: Turkish

“Maybe we landed on a planet entirely populated by women"
"Then maybe I should lead"
"Hmmm, ok. But don't forget to walk cool”


Infamously named for lifting footage straight from “Star Wars IV:A New Hope,” and not even done subtly, this is the only Turkish film I know of, and presumably was considered to be so awful that it wasn't worth anybodies time to follow up with a lawsuit. Clearly given the budget shown they wouldn't have got much in the way of monetary compensation at any rate. In fact, for a time it was considered by IMDB to be one of the worst films ever created, but fortunately it falls into that category of awful that also happens to be hilarious. Call me crazy, but seeing Turkish guys crying out “Tornado 2! Tornado 2” whilst flying a ship around the “Earth's protective layer of "human brain molecules," known as a Death Star to you and me, shooting at X-Wings, TIE's and the Millennium Falcon randomly, all to the Indiana Jones theme tune couldn't fail to not bring a grin to my face.

But to call it nothing more than a mere clone of Star Wars doesn't feel as though the film is done justice. Indeed there is as much in the way of Battlestar Galactica's “Cylons” (the original series I'm referring to here) fought by Captain Kirk's alien-loving Turkish counterpart in the mix, as well as the occasional Dr. Who-like foe and that robot that seems to have made an appearance in more low budget flicks than anyone could watch in a lifetime. Also akin to Star Wars is a mysterious and unknown force to be mastered, forcing our hapless heroes to plummet to the Alien planet below. I thought it was called gravity too, but apparently its really a magician who looks a little like John-Rhys Davies. Take that science!

Now, I've been assured that the translations on the copy in my possession – bar a few typo's, grammar errors and spelling mistakes – is correct, the film doesn't make any more sense in Turkish, so bear with me here. Our two fighter-pilot leads – as already mentioned – are dragged down to the ground by a mysterious force which isn't gravity, only to find themselves attacked by skeletons after confusing the mating whistle with the skeletons-attack-me whistle. Drawing the attention of the mysterious immortal Magician who controls this planet, he captures them and realises they are human unlike the other humans around him. They soon escape, and knowing that the key to conquering the planet Earth is in understanding the human brain, he sets his minions to re-capture them. Fighting against his armies of skeletons, cylons, purring cat-people and guys in Halloween masks who spend too long watching Jackie Chan films, they seek the legendary wooden sword, made by melting a mountain and vanquish the evil Magician.

In other words, no, this isn't the sort of film you'd want to watch without ample supply of beer. This is a film so cheap that when a fight breaks out in Mos Eisley Cantina – yes, they rip this off too – at no point do they bother to edit out when the masks fall off; a film so moronic that randomly exploding heads, detachable arms and karate chopping people in half are more than merely plausible but likely. Part of me feels compelled to call this out as the atrocity that it is, seemingly unaware of just how bad a film they've made and demonstrating the most gratuitous display of plagiarism I've ever witnessed. Yet at the same time, that's precisely what made me want to watch it in the first place, and very few films have made me laugh as hard as this one did.

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