Beyto (Swiss German / Turkish)

Stories about migrant families in relation to the queer aspects have always fascinated me. Normally, you see subjects that deal with these families' inherent bias towards their own traditions and trying to assimilate themselves in the western culture. Stuff like homosexuality always throws them off leading to conflicts which is always a subject for wonderful drama. Set in Switzerland, this story is about a Turkish migrant family.

Beyto is the only son of migrant Turkish family in Switzerland who own a kebab store. Beyto is ideal son, student and well liked at work. As he spends more time with his swimming mentor Mike, they both realize that they like each other. In love with Mike and tired of hiding himself, the news soon reach his family and spreads fast in the community. The parents who are still bound to the patriarchal and heteronormative society of their Turkish village, they trick Beyto into going with them to Turkey with a secret plan to get him married to his childhood friend Seher without his knowledge. Unable to escape from village, he is forced to get married to her but tells her the truth after getting married. She is of course heartbroken, but then she has also been looking this as an opportunity to escape her village and pursue her studies. Back in Switzerland, more drama enfolds as Mike comes to know of the truth and the family continues to pressure Beyto. Increasingly Beyto struggles to manage his duty to the girl who has no fault in any of this and also his love for Mike, whom he can't forget and live without.

As interesting the film premise is and I quite enjoyed it, I have to say that the final resolution of the film is not what I expected, and also it felt very very rushed and sudden. All his drama for over 90 minutes and the plan and execution of the trio to move to Germany was very rushed. Suddenly rivals Mike and Seher are ok with the trio arrangement. It seemed a bit off to me. A lot of people may fail to understand and would question how can a man be forced to marry, but trust me, I come from eat and these things do happen. Social pressure, family pressure, emotional blackmail makes you do many things. So I could totally relate with Beyto's helplessness when he has to marry a girl knowing very well that its not the right thing to do. A good chunk of the film is set I a village in Turkey where you can understand that the people still live in the age old beliefs. EVen Beyto's parents truly believe in their heart that their son will change once he is married and they continue to do so even after he is married, but only it's too late. They underestimated his love for Mike. The performances overall are quite good. Beyto is extremely handsome and does a good job, except in scenes which require confrontations. He suddenly starts screaming without emotion and all those scenes just fall fat in my opinion. Mike, on the other hand was strictly ok. Both from character perspective and as an actor. Seher is one character that stood out. Poor girl is confused as tow hat dod she do wrong and why is she being punished. But thankfully it turns out that she is stringer than you think she is and is willing to use this as an opportunity to turn around her life. The film tries to paint a realistic and sensitive portrait of a budding and seemingly impossible love which obvious hurdles. This is nothing new and we have seen it plenty before but its the treatment which differentiates it.

The film is no great shakes but this is the kind of story that I can connect with easily on a very personal level and hence, I will be biased. But even then, I don't think you would dislike the film. It's a well intentioned, very dramatic film; I just hope the actors and the director did a slightly better job. (6.5/10)