Petition “Enough Silenced”: Solidarity with the actress Merve Aksoy

In these weeks, almost seven years after the Weinstein revelations, the French film industry is experiencing something like the first MeToo movement, which is also seriously affecting the public. After actress Judith Godrèche’s recent rape allegations against her former partner, the director Benoît Jacquot, with whom she had a long-term relationship as a 14-year-old, after the recent escapades of Gerard Depardieu and new allegations against the director Roman Polanski, who has been in France since finds shelter from the American authorities after his escape in 1978, the level of tolerability also seems to have been reached in libertarian France.

The MeToo debate is still fermenting in Germany

In Germany, the debate about abuse of power on film sets, which often seamlessly leads to sexual assault, has been brewing for a long time; It is always about protecting crew members who have no chance of defending themselves within the structures of the industry. Nastassja Kinski had to fight for years to ensure that NDR no longer broadcast the “Tatort” episode “Reifezeugnis” from 1977, in which she was portrayed as a half-naked Lolita as a 15-year-old.

She says today that she felt uncomfortable in front of the camera even back then. The fact that it was not just a fad of the 1970s to expose a young woman to the public without protection is shown by the fact that until recently the public broadcaster refused to comply with the now 63-year-old’s request to show the film to take part in the program.

For a week now, an open letter has been circulating under the hashtag #enuggeschwiegen, which calls on Minister of State for Culture Claudia Roth to finally put her words from last year into action. In May, after the highly publicized Til Schweiger case, Roth called for “complete clarification”: “The times of patriarchal bullies should really be over.”

There is a lot of talk about diversity in the current draft bill for a new film funding law, but there is still no binding code of conduct. This has been announced for the summer of 2024, but still as a “voluntary commitment”. He would have no consequences for perpetrators on the film set.

The current focus of the open letter is the trial of actress Merve Aksoy before the Berlin labor court against director Engin Kundağ. Legally it is a breach of contract, but for the actress there is much more at stake.

The now 30-year-old accuses the director of using nude photos of her in the film, which she was pressured to take, against her verbal agreement. The actress only realized this attack in shock when she saw “Ararat” at the Berlinale in February 2023. In a longer scene, Zeynep, played by Aksoy, masturbates, and in another she is raped.

Almost 20,000 people have now signed the open letter #enoughsilent on the Change.org platform. Aksoy is far from alone with her recent allegations against certain structures in the film industry, in which women in particular are not sufficiently protected.

The documentary “Against Silence – Abuse of Power in Theater and Film” by Kira Gantner and Zita Zengerling, currently available in the ARD media library (produced by NDR of all places), for which the makers spoke to 200 people from the theater and film industry, makes it clear that cases like Dieter Wedel or Til Schweiger are just the tip of the iceberg.

Many allegations range from a harsh tone on set to psychological pressure during filming to criminal offenses such as sexual abuse. But the patterns are always similar – as is how to deal with such behavior. The complicity in the cover-up, according to the call #enoughsilent, extends to the production companies.

According to a “Stern” article in February that made Aksoy’s story public, other actresses on the set of Kundağ had similar experiences. Nevertheless, he continues to make films, even with government funding. “Ararat” received funding of 350,000 euros, Arte and Saarländischer Rundfunk acted as co-producers.

This is exactly where a code of conduct should start, when it comes to money; But the consequences must not end at this point. The industry’s voluntary commitment – for example to create contact points where victims of abuse can turn – has not borne fruit. As long as the fear of speaking prevails (or the disillusionment that misbehavior has no consequences anyway), nothing will change. Merve Aksoy has decided to speak. The next hearing date before the Berlin Labor Court is on June 19th.