The Republican ideals Sample Clauses

The Republican ideals realities, and cinema: According to Ulus, in May 1945, three young men in Ankara committed a series of robberies. When they were caught, they told the police that they needed to find money because they had decided to go to Texas, buy land, and become cowboys like Hollywood stars.438 These 435 “Fatih ve Topkapı’daki törende yüzbinlerce İstanbullu bulundu,” Vatan, 30 May 1953; see: Gavin D. Brockett, “Chapter 6: Mustafa Kemal Atatürk and Mehmed the Conqueror: Negotiating A National Historical Narrative,” How Happy to Call Oneself a Turk (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2011), 173-202. 436 Ferdi Öner, “Fethin 500 üncü yıldönümü tören ve şenlikleri basladi,” Cumhuriyet, 30 May 1953. 437 Mumtas Faik Fenik, “Seferihisar’da Genç Ulubatlı Hasanlar,” Zafer, 30 May 1953. 438 “Ankara Kovboyları,” Ulus, 8 May 1945, 3. three young men probably had watched Hollywood films and wanted the same life depicted in those films. As this example shows, some ‘common men’ were familiar with America due to Hollywood movies. Turkey’s participation in the Korean War as a US ally intensified this familiarity by adding the ideological aspect, and the result of this was the reproduction of political myths through the lenses of anti-communism. This reinforced cultural and religious conservatism and contributed to the rhetorical power shift from ‘elites’ to ‘common man.’ In fact, before the 1950s, domestic production was limited in Turkish cinema. Due to economic insufficiency, neither the state nor the private capital holders were to produce systematically. Eighty per cent of the film companies were short-lived, low-budgeted, shot only one feature film on average per year. As a result, the supply of films was predominantly provided by American and Egyptian films. However, there was a difference between consumer demands for each. Öztuna states, “American films were only popular in big cities, whereas Egyptian films were shown for weeks even in small towns.”439 The US Department of Commerce also referred to the popularity as cited by Gürata: “In the İstanbul, İzmir and Ankara regions, United States films are definitely preferred, while European films and particularly British films meet with favor…In the rest of the country, United States films, although well- received, do not meet as much favor as Egyptian films.”440 It seems that the audience of the time preferred Egyptian films over Hollywood films when given a choice. Tekelioğlu notes that, in the 1940s, approximately 150 Egyptian fi...