Coffee Futures

Coffee Futures weaves individual fortunes with the story of Turkey's decades-long attempts to become a member of the European Union. Promises and predictions made by politicians, both foreign and domestic, are juxtaposed with the rhetorics and practices of coffee fortune telling.

The widespread custom of coffee fortune telling in Turkey is an everyday communication tool. Coffee fortunes are a way of dealing with hopes, fears and worries, as well as a method of indirectly voicing matters usually left unspoken. Like any language, this narrative form has its protocols, rules and tropes; yet each fortune bears distinct marks of the teller's personal style and the individual fortune seeker's condition.

Thus, the filmmaker sets out to seek her fortune and flip her cup for a couple dozen people, both friends and strangers. These amateur fortune tellers all read her individual fortune as they might any other day, except that she also asks for their opinions on the future of Turkey and Europe.

July 31, 2009 marked the 50th year anniversary of Turkey's application to apply to the elusive European Union (maiden name: European Economic Community). On this seemingly endless path, Turkey's future is continually invoked and described, yet not quite within reach. Touching upon the psychology of collective waiting and anticipating a national future, Coffee Futures attempts to render the emotional texture of a society whose fate has been nationally and internationally debated - often in relation to its "Europeanness" - for a long, long time.