Women’s power, in both cinema and academia, takes center stage at the 16th Crime and Punishment Film Festival, with tickets officially going on sale on November 6.

Award-winning films directed by women and the ongoing fight for gender equality highlight this year’s festival program, while the Academic Program takes a close look at the future of the Istanbul Convention. Showcasing 35 feature-length and short films hailing from 36 countries, the event places the pursuit of justice and equality at the very heart of cinema. Furthermore, the festival will contribute significantly to legal discourse by examining how the Istanbul Convention is being implemented across 20 countries.

Festival Schedule, Venues, and Ticketing

Organized by the Justice and Cinema Association under the guiding principle of “Justice for All,” the 16th International Crime and Punishment Film Festival runs from November 27 to December 2, following an opening ceremony on November 26 at the Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality (IMM) Cemal Reşit Rey Concert Hall. Chaired by Prof. Dr.Adem Sözüer, with Prof. Dr. Bengi Semerci serving as Festival Director and Alin Taşçıyan as Program Director, the festival will screen justice-themed global cinema at the IMM Beyoğlu Cinema and Kadıköy Municipality’s Cinematheque/Cinema House.

Tickets are available via Passo starting November 6. Embracing the motto “Festival for all, cinema for all!”, ticket prices are kept accessible:

• TRY 100 for daytime screenings
• TRY 150 for 9:30 p.m. screenings
• TRY 50 for students at all screenings

Academic and VisionIST Programs

In addition to the Golden Scale International Feature and Short Film Competitions, the festival bridges cinema and law through three distinct film sections, its Academic Program, and VisionIST events, encouraging audiences to view justice through multiple lenses.

Developed with input from various universities and civil society organizations, this year’s Academic Program tackles crimes of violence against women, judicial processes, and the future of the Istanbul Convention. Centered around the question “Quo Vadis, Istanbul Convention?”, experts from convention-signatory nations will present national reports, while academics and students compile the report specifically for Türkiye. Meanwhile, VisionIST panels will use the medium of cinema to discuss contemporary social challenges.

Opening Night and Honorary Awards

The festival kicks off on the evening of November 26 with a performance of Mozart’s opera The Marriage of Figaro at the newly renovated IMM Cemal Reşit Rey Concert Hall, accompanying a screening of Agnès Jaoui’s L’Objet du délit / Crescendo.

The opening ceremony will also honor several distinguished figures:

• Cinema Honorary Awards: Presented to Mahamat-Saleh Haroun and Handan İpekçi.
• Academic Honorary Award: Presented to Prof. Dr. Liane Wörner.
• Contribution to Cinema Award: Presented to Azize Tan.

A Competition Filled with Compelling Stories

Golden Scale International Feature Film Competition

Featuring 13 acclaimed films selected from major international festivals, this competition explores justice, freedom, and human rights through diverse narratives touching on women’s rights, migration, political repression, discrimination, the devastating tolls of war, and social inequality. Featuring 13 acclaimed films selected from major international festivals, this competition explores justice, freedom, and human rights through diverse narratives touching on women’s rights, migration, political repression, discrimination, the devastating tolls of war, and social inequality. Among those films ten will compete for Eurimages Audentia Award: Daughters of Abraham, Head to Head, I Matter, Milo, Sisters, Sisters in Arms, Skateboarding is not for Girls, Strawberries, The Last Resort, The Meltdown.

• Birds of War (Directed by Janay Boulos and Abd Alkader Habak): A Sundance favorite that traces the love story of two journalists whose lives intersect during the war in Syria, balancing a poignant romance with questions of journalistic ethics.
• Drei Kameradinnen / Sisters in Arms (Adapted by Milena Aboyan from Shida Bazyar’s novel): Examines racism, othering, and the mechanics of justice through three immigrant-background women in Germany.
• El Deshielo / The Meltdown (Directed by Manuela Martelli): Another Cannes Un Certain Regard selection and Chile’s Oscar submission, focusing on a story of disappearance as Chilean society reckons with the shadow of the Pinochet dictatorship.
• Hangar Rojo / Red Hangar (Directed by Juan Pablo Sallato): Explores an officer’s moral dilemma between conscience and military duty during Chile’s 1973 coup.
• Hermanas / Sisters (Feature debut by Ione Hernández Sáenz, starring Elena Anaya and Emma Suárez): Explores the friction between love, loyalty, and justice following an allegation of sexual assault within a family.
• I Matter (Directed by Alina Şerban): The Venice Film Festival Audience Award winner is an autobiographical debut about a young Roma woman raised in institutional care who pursues an acting career while battling social prejudice.
• La Mas Dulce / Strawberries (Directed by Laila Marrakchi): Competing in Cannes’ Un Certain Regard and selected as Morocco’s Oscar entry, this film highlights the exploitation, discrimination, and solidarity of Moroccan seasonal agricultural workers in Spain.
• Les filles d’Abraham / Daughters of Abraham (Directed by Hanaël El Yousfi): Premiered internationally in Toronto, this film tackles patriarchal oppression, cyberbullying, and the pursuit of emancipation through a friendship between two young women of differing faiths.
• Milo (Directed by Nicole Garcia, starring Marion Cotillard, Laure Calamy, and Théodore Pellerin): Selected for competition at San Sebastián, this narrative investigates crime, social inequality, and justice through a mother confronting her past.
• Paradis / The Last Resort (Directed by Maria Sødahl): Explores European social hypocrisy, migration hostility,and racism through the moral dilemma of a Danish couple who accidentally strike an Afghan refugee with their car in the Canary Islands.
• Roya (Directed by Iranian director Mahnaz Mohammadi, starring Melisa Sözen): World-premiered in the Berlinale’s Panorama section, this narrative follows the grueling efforts of authorities to break a woman who resisted severe torture in Iran’s Evin Prison.
• Sar beh Sar / Head to Head (Directed by Ghasideh Golmakani): A Toronto International Film Festival premiere that uses sharp humor to depict a woman director fighting to make a movie amid Iranian restrictions.
• Skejtanje ne e za devojčinja / Skateboarding Is Not for Girls (Directed by Dina Duma): Winner of the Tribeca Nora Ephron Award and North Macedonia’s Oscar entry, following an 11-year-old girl striving to win a skateboarding competition while breaking free from child marriage, poverty, and tradition.

(Directors Dina Duma, Ghasideh Golmakani, Mahnaz Mohammadi, Maria Sødahl, Hanaël El Yousfi, Alina Şerban, Hernández Sáenz and actor Bayan Leyla from Sisters in Arms will attend their respective screenings for Q&A sessions.)

Golden Scale International Short Film Competition

Showcasing 12 global shorts that address universal concerns like war, migration, discrimination, and social pressure through personal narratives:

• Allá En El Cielo / Nobody Knows the World (Roddy Dextre)
• Et si Thuy n’existait pas / And If Thuy Didn’t Exist (Carlo Francisco Manatad)
• Crimson Silence (Sergios DeLaurentis)
• Dirigentas / Conductor (Antanas Skucas)
• İstiğfar ya da Kar / Repentance or Snow (Ece Begüm Bayrak)
• La shay’ yahduth ba’da ghiyabik / Nothing Happens After Your Absence (Ibrahim Omar)
• O / It (Ferdi Ayaz)
• Ротація / Rotation (Maryna Er Gorbach)
• Silent Voices (Nadine Misong Jin)
• tj28 / 28 Days Left (Yasmin Najjar)
• Visite En Terre Irradiée / Visit Into Irradiated Land (Anne-Sophie Girault)
• Yek Rooz-e Shirin / A Sweet Day (Omid Abdollahi)

(Directors Yasmin Najjar, Antanas Skucas, Sergios DeLaurentis, Ferdi Ayaz, Ece Begüm Bayrak, and Maryna Er Gorbach will attend their respective screenings for Q&A sessions.)

Festival Juries

• Feature Film Competition Jury: Chaired by director Mahamat-Saleh Haroun, joined by producer Rossitsa Valkanova (Bulgaria), director/screenwriter Tolga Karaçelik (Türkiye), producer Olena Yershova (Ukraine), and festival director Margherita Cascio (Switzerland).
• Eurimages Audentia Award Panel: Composed of Eurimages representative Anne Christine Knoth alongside feature jury members Tolga Karaçelik and Olena Yershova.
• SİYAD (Turkish Film Critics Association) Jury: Comprising Emre Eminoğlu, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Fırat Sayıcı, and Yeşim Tabak.
• Student Jury: Consisting of Rabia Arol, Nazlı Cihan, Ali Kısagün, Eren Kömürlüoğlu, and Melike Zeynep Yardımcı.
• Short Film Competition Jury: Consisting of film critic Maria Giovanna Vagenas, director/producer Serpil Altın,and actor Erdem Şenocak.

Expanding Award Categories

This year features an unprecedented lineup of awards across seven distinct categories:

• Golden Scale Feature Film Award: TRY 450,000
• Golden Scale Short Film Award: TRY 60,000
• Audentia Award: EUR 30,000 in Eurimages support for a female director’s next project, presented as a special accolade.
• Masharawi Film Fund Award: EUR 1,500 dedicated to the film championing human rights most powerfully.
• Attorney Emre Özmen Award: TRY 75,000 presented by his family to the Student Jury’s winning film director.
• Short Film Special Awards: Sponsored separately by Çavuş & Coşkunsu Law Firm and Elmadağ Law and Consultancy (TRY 30,000 each).

Spotlight on Honorary Award Recipients

• Mahamat-Saleh Haroun: A leading light of African cinema, recognized for tackling political conflict and social struggle. His film Soumsoum, la nuit des astres / Soumsoum, the Night of the Stars will screen out of competition after winning the FIPRESCI Prize at Berlin.
• Handan İpekçi: Celebrated for cinematic explorations of Turkish social and political issues through human connections (Dad is in the Army, Hejar, Hidden Faces).
• Prof. Dr. Liane Wörner: A University of Konstanz criminal and comparative law professor specializing in gender,reproductive rights, and legal digitalization.
• Azize Tan: Key figure in independent Turkish film culture, former Istanbul Film Festival director (2006–2016), and founding director of the Ayvalık International Film Festival.

Non-Competitive Sections & Special Screenings

Scales of Justice Section

Four diverse films investigating impunity, family secrets, women’s solidarity, and historical conscience:

• Canavar / Monster (Directed by Tunç Şahin): Adapted from his own play, this single-location drama explores family secrets, silence, and the heavy impact of patriarchal structures. Starring Tülin Özen, Gülçin Kültür Şahin,and Hakan Emre Ünal. Şahin will host a Q&A.
• Down the Arm of God (Directed by Peter Brunner): A psychological drama starring Caleb Landry Jones and produced by Luc Besson, examining faith, prejudice, and social hypocrisy when a pastor shelters homeless people during a severe winter storm.
• Les Survivants du Che / Che Guevara: The Last Companions (Directed by Christophe Dimitri Réveille): A documentary born from 22 years of research, following six surviving guerrillas of Che Guevara’s 1967 Bolivian campaign. Narrated by Vincent Lindon.
• Soumsoum, la nuit des astres / Soumsoum, the Night of the Stars (Directed by Mahamat-Saleh Haroun): A poetic blend of Chadian oral traditions, myth, and generational trauma following a visionary 17-year-old girl in Chad. Haroun will host a Q&A.

Tribute to Prof. Dr. İoanna Kuçuradi

Paying homage to the late pioneer of philosophy and human rights in Türkiye under the banner “Human’s right to be human”:

• Enjoy Your Stay (Directed by Dominik Locher): Follows an undocumented Filipina migrant working in the Swiss Alps. Locher will host a Q&A.
• Ich verstehe Ihren Unmut / I Understand Your Displeasure (Directed by Kilian A. Friedrich): Explores the moral conflicts of a cleaning company employee caught between management demands and worker needs.

Tribute to Attorney Emre Özmen

Commemorating the young, idealistic lawyer who passed away in 2023:

• 27 (Directed by Barış Pehlivan, scripted by Barış Terkoğlu): A documentary capturing Özmen’s life through testimonies from loved ones and colleagues.
• Ritorno a Buenos Aires / Back to Buenos Aires (Directed by Marco Bechis): A Venice premiere following a doctor returning to Argentina after 33 years in exile to testify against his torturers.
• Une affaire turque / A Turkish Case (Directed by Hüseyin Aydın Gürsoy): Follows a Turkish-origin lawyer in France confronting systemic corruption while defending a victim of a racist attack. Gürsoy will host a Q&A.

VisionIST Events Schedule

Held free of charge at the Pera Hall of IMM Beyoğlu Cinema from November 27 to December 1:

• Friday, November 27 (12:00 p.m.): Masterclass with Mahamat-Saleh Haroun, moderated by Alin Taşçıyan.
• Saturday, November 28 (12:00 p.m.): Panel – “Is Organizing a Film Festival Easy?” featuring Azize Tan and Margherita Cascio, moderated by Prof. Dr. Bengi Semerci.
• Sunday, November 29 (12:00 p.m.): Panel – Commemorating Prof. Dr. İoanna Kuçuradi, featuring directors Emine Emel Balcı and Erdem Tepegöz, moderated by Zeynep İspir.
• Monday, November 30 (12:00 p.m.): Panel – “Sometimes Conscience Hurts” with speakers Bedirhan Üstün, Halil Sözmen, Sinem Acar, and Hande Öğüt, moderated by M. Emin Önder.
• Tuesday, December 1 (2:00 p.m.): Special screening of the documentary 27 at Beyoğlu Cinema, followed by a discussion with Barış Pehlivan, Barış Terkoğlu, and attorney Hüseyin Ersöz, moderated by Prof. Dr. Adem Sözüer.

Festival Poster and Visuals

This year’s festival poster, designed by İlke Büyükkalaycı, features Themis—the goddess of justice who inspired the Golden Scale trophy—standing among the ancient columns of the Basilica Cistern. Following her journey aboard the iconic İstiklal Avenue tram in last year’s artwork, Themis continues her symbolic travels across Istanbul.