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In a region where the silence imposed by the State hides decades of violence, a seven-year-old girl sees what adults refuse to see. This is the story of
Hidden Point
, film by the German-Kurdish director
Ayse Polat
which arrived in Brazilian cinemas this Thursday, 24.
Acclaimed at the Berlin Film Festival, the film blends drama and psychological thriller to portray the scars left by an unresolved past—personal, political, and collective—delving into the open wounds of transgenerational Kurdish trauma.
Set in the northeast of Turkey, the film follows a German documentary team, an agent involved in a surveillance network, and his seven-year-old daughter, who perceives much more than adults assume. With a structure divided into chapters and footage shot in different formats, the film builds a growing atmosphere of tension, revealing a complex web of conspiracy, trauma, and paranoia.
“When a society suppresses its past, when crimes go unpunished and voices are silenced, nothing really disappears. It transforms. It creates ghosts – ghosts that continue to haunt the living until they are seen and named,” says the director, to
radarsantri.com
. Em
Hidden Point
, third film of an informal trilogy set in eastern Turkey, Polat dives into the historical Kurdish traumas with an approach that mixes supernatural elements and political realism to talk about violence, memory and silence.
Next, check out the interview with the filmmaker about the film, silence, and the future.
The film addresses the transgenerational trauma of the Kurds and the conflict between Kurds and Turks in eastern Turkey. What inspired you to explore such a sensitive topic, and how did you balance the representation of the perspectives of the victims and the perpetrators?
I have Kurdish-Alevi roots, and my family emigrated to Germany in 1978 for political reasons. I grew up with the silence of my parents, shaped by traumas they couldn’t speak about. For a long time, I myself pushed this silence away. Then, in 2015, while doing an artistic residency in Istanbul, I came across the “Saturday Mothers.” Since 1995, these Kurdish mothers have been protesting – their children were kidnapped in the 1990s by Turkish counter-guerrilla forces. Their silent protest in the middle of a busy street seemed like an open wound. This really touched me and became the spark to write the script. But soon I realized I didn’t want to tell the story only from the victims’ side. I wanted to look at the perpetrators as well – not to justify what they did, but to try to understand the system that makes this kind of violence possible. It was about digging into how violence enters people, how it remains, and continues to repeat itself.
The narrative structure of “Ponto Oculto” is divided into three chapters, each using different types of cameras (professional, mobile, surveillance). How did you develop this stylistic approach, and what does it represent in terms of narrative perspective?
The three-part structure came from my initial idea to write it as a project of
found-footage
– a genre related to horror that suited the emotional tone and offered practical advantages, especially considering the challenges of financing such a film in Germany. Although I later abandoned the approach of
found-footage
Due to its limitations, the structural concept remained. In addition to the three media, there is the little girl Melek, who also acts as a medium and, with her penetrating gaze, captures everything in the best way. Using these different media really emphasizes what the film is about at its core: seeing and what remains invisible. Who has the right to see? Who is allowed to be seen? And what is intentionally kept out of sight?
The film mixes elements of a political thriller with touches of the supernatural. How did you decide to incorporate this element to address the “blind spot” of the unresolved story, and what role does the supernatural play in the narrative?
The supernatural gave me a language to express what violence leaves behind, the emptiness, the fractures. When a society suppresses its past, when crimes go unpunished and voices are silenced, nothing really disappears. It transforms. It creates ghosts – ghosts that continue to haunt the living until they are seen and named. The genre really helped me capture many different layers of the subject that I wouldn’t have been able to with a regular drama. And at the same time, it allowed me to tell the story in an engaging way, even for people who are not familiar with the political context.
You described ‘Ponto Oculto’ as the third film of a trilogy set in eastern Turkey. How does this film connect with ‘The Others’ and ‘The Heiress’, and what thematic or stylistic evolution did you aim for in this conclusion?
All three films deal with the theme of trauma and were filmed in eastern Turkey.
The Heir
(2013) was a more personal story: a German-Kurdish writer travels to her father’s village to investigate an incident from his past. Three years later came
The Others
, a documentary about the Armenian genocide in the Kurdish region of Turkey. In both films, the focus was on what violence and oppression leave behind – both in the individual psyche and in collective memory. With
Hidden Point
, I wanted to go even deeper into these invisible, inherited wounds. What also connects all three films is their fragmented narrative structure. I believe that memory, violence, and trauma do not unfold linearly. Fragmentation allows ambiguity, gaps, and silence, creating space for the indescribable.
The film was highly praised for its approach to paranoia and political repression. How do you see the impact of “Point of No Return” on the dialogue about Kurdish history and human rights in a global context?
I am very grateful that my film has touched so many people. I think it’s because transgenerational trauma is something with which many of us can relate on a deep level. In the Kurdish community, I often see a mix of gratitude and relief — people feeling seen, because the film talks about things that are usually pushed aside or silenced. It would be amazing if this could generate a broader conversation about human rights. Because honestly, while we don’t face these wounds, society remains broken — trapped in a cycle where violence only leads to more violence. Breaking this cycle means remembering, confronting, and having empathy. And we need spaces like art and cinema to make these painful processes visible, not to blame, but to help us recover what makes us human. Because in the end, only a society brave enough to face its own darkness can truly begin to heal.
The film addresses the Kurdish transgenerational trauma and the historical blind spot regarding the genocide, which is often only discussed while it is happening. What is the role of cinema in promoting dialogue about genocides and issues related to human rights violations?
Cinema has this incredible power to show us what is usually silenced, ignored, or erased – the bodies, the truths, the pain. And honestly, just making this visible is already a form of resistance. Through its form, its voice, and the emotions it can rehumanize what history has dehumanized.
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