Beystiman It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

FuzzyTagz If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

ChanFamous I wanted to like it more than I actually did... But much of the humor totally escaped me and I walked out only mildly impressed.

Gurlyndrobb While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

SnoopyStyle Umay leaves her abusive husband Kemal in Istanbul with her son Cem to go home to Germany. Her father Kader is concerned about the family's honor. The older brother Mehmet is angry. The youngest brother Acar is scared but kind. Kemal rejects Umay but wants his son Cem back. As Kader and Mehmet try to force the situation, Umay calls the police and she escapes with Cem to a women's shelter. She finds a job with a supportive boss and a new boyfriend. Her younger sister Rana is rejected by her fiancee's father due to the situation. Rana tells her mother that she's desperate to marry Duran because she's secretly pregnant. Kader has to pay off the father to get them married. Umay shows up unexpectedly at the wedding and has a meltdown. Even Acar is forced to confront the lost of family honor.The portrait of the lost of family honor is devastating. The pressure feels real. The need for Umay to reconnect with her family does feel unreasonable and excessive. I doubt a reasonable Umay would show up at the wedding. After the wedding, it seems impossible for her to go to the hospital especially carrying her son with her. Then the final scene has too many twists. It only accentuates the twisty manufactured nature of the writing. Writer/director Feo Aladag needs to tone down some of the more melodramatic developments in the last act.

Sindre Kaspersen Austrian screenwriter, producer and director Feo Aladag's feature film debut which she wrote and co-produced, premiered in the Panorama section at the 60th Berlin International Film Festival in 2010, was shot on location in Turkey and Germany and is a German production which was produced by Turkish screenwriter, producer and director Züli Aladag. It tells the story about a 25-year-old woman named Umay Aslan who after having had an operation at a hospital in Germany, returns to Istanbul, Turkey where she lives with her adolescent son named Cem, her husband named Kemal and his family. Umay has gotten enough of all the suppression she has endured from Kemal, and the day after her return she packs her bags, takes her son, leaves her miserable marriage and travels to Germany where she thinks she will be welcomed by her parents named Kader and Halyme whom is living there with her brothers named Mehmet and Arcan and her sister named Rana. Distinctly and precisely directed by Austrian filmmaker Feo Aladag, this quietly paced fictional tale which is narrated from multiple viewpoints though mostly from the main character's point of view, draws a reflective and increasingly dramatic portrayal of an adult Turkish-German woman whom after making a decision regarding the best interest and future of her child and herself comes to her parents believing that they will support her viewpoint and learns that their stand on her choice is that she is selfish and that she has disgraced the family name. While notable for it's atmospheric and naturalistic milieu depictions, sterling cinematography by German cinematographer Judith Kaufmann, production design by German production designer Silke Buhr and use of sound, colors and light, this character-driven and narrative-driven story about family relations where the youngest daughter in a family who is about to get married suffers the consequences of her sister's actions, a father and mother and their two sons becomes so ashamed due to their regard of other peoples thoughts and views that they disown their family member and a mother who will no longer jeopardize the well-being of herself and her son for the sake of honouring the expectations of others, depicts two isolating and merging studies of character and contains a great score by German-born British composer Max Richter and Czech composer Stéphane Moucha.This cinematographic, consequential and gently romantic drama from the late 2000s which is set during a summer in Germany in the 21st century and where a father is struggling to forgive his eldest daughter whom has gone against his will and a courageous woman whom is unwanted by her family is heard by a friend and meets a German man named Stipe, is impelled and reinforced by it's cogent narrative structure, substantial character development, rhythmic continuity, pivotal instrumental tones and dialog, scenes of Umay, Umay and Cem and Umay and Stipe and the poignant acting performances by German actress of Turkish descent Sibel Kekilli, Turkish-born German actress Nursel Köse, Turkish actor Settar Tanriögen, Turkish-German actor Tamer Yigit and German actor Florian Lukas. A subtle, sociological and gracefully humane directorial debut which gained, among several other awards, the Label Europa Cinemas Award Feo Aladag at the 60th Berlin Film Festival in 2010.

halle lujah The writer obviously intended to shock the viewers with the surprise ending, and he did, but it ruined the movie. I could have understood murdering the mother (understood, that is, not approved of), but murdering the child just doesn't fit the story. For one thing, male (not female) children were highly valued. For another, the father said he wanted his son (but not his wife) back, and made a feeble attempt to get him back. During that attempt, his father-in-law chastised him, telling him that a physical tug-of-war in the street was not the way to go about it. So, the father-in-law would then approve of killing the boy? Not likely! Now, some people have said that the boy was killed by accident, but that's incredibly sloppy. It would have been easy to kill the mother without harming the child. And, call it bad acting, but the brother's reaction to killing the child did not look like surprise to me! It would have been a far better ending for the mother to pick up the gun off the street and shoot her brother, who was advancing toward her with a knife.

Ruben Mooijman After seeing this film, I assumed it was directed by a Turkish director named Feo Aladag. When I googled this name, a picture of a young blond woman filled the screen. As it turned out, Feo Aladag is an Austrian actress/director, married to Turkish/German author Zuli Aladag, who is also the producer of Die Fremde. I mention this because I think it is important. In this film, the Turkish community in Germany is not pictured in a very favourable way. The story shows the fate of Umay, a young Turkish/German woman who wants a divorce because her husband beats her and because, perhaps more importantly, she doesn't love him. She leaves her husband and moves with her young son to her family in Berlin. Surprisingly, her father and brother take sides with her husband and urge her to return to him. In their view, she has dishonoured her husband and her own family by separating her son from his father. This conflict escalates in a dramatic way, with terrible consequences. The film pictures Umay as a woman who is denied her 'Western' rights as a woman and a mother, and shows her family as driven by 'non-Western' values like honour and tradition. For them, the community is superior over the individual. For her, it's the other way round. The message is pessimistic. Umay is a Turkish woman who adopts the German lifestyle. She wants to live her own life. She follows the integration model that the Turkish people in Western Europe are supposed to follow. But her brother and sister don't support her, although they are born and raised in Germany. They speak the German language, but think the Turkish way. Like some of the films of Faith Akin (in which lead actress Sibel Kekilli also starred) this film focuses on the problems of the Turkish community in Germany. But it has a darker and more pessimistic tone. It's a very powerful movie, dealing with a very urgent issue.