"What is a human anyway" is set in modern day Istanbul in Turkey. Ali,who is a guy in his late twenties,has an accident while working as a taxi driver. He has had a temporary amnesia. Although he comes to remember in time many of the people who live in his apartment building, he cannot somehow remember his father, Rasih (Koksal Engur), a retired health officer.During his struggle to sort himself out we see people around him joining the same struggle. The movie looks like an absurd comedy at first look but it explores common themes in an unusual circus-like ambiance. Circumcision at an early age,doing one's military service(for a man), leaving your father's home when it is due time(unlike the Westernized way of leaving home when you turn 18)are rituals of Turkish culture.In the movie we see a little boy who refuses to be circumcised, a young man who refuses to do his military service, a 30-year-old man refusing to leave home. There is also deeper structure of subtexts in the movie. For instance Both Ali and his next door friend Keten are inhibited guys who have probably been repressed by their parents during their childhood. The seamstress(Keten's mother) represents the tough single mother who has an increasing role in the Turkish social life in the last decade.Umit, the gymnast performer is also a girl who is stuck between the devil and the deep blue sea(her expatriate past in Germany and her struggle to keep up with her Turkish origins.)The pregnant woman is a total absurdity in that candid neighborhood because the middle class morality still rules the suburbs of Turkey and still it's not easy for people to tolerate a woman who will bring a kid out of wed-lock but we can accept that as the message of the director. In short "Korkuyorum Anne" is not a low comedy which is aimed at belly laughs like other comedy potboilers which have been profusely produced in the last decade in Turkey. It has an intellectual side to be looked into. Sweet,original, and funny even if it looks absurd!
