Cici follows a Turkish family reuniting 30 years after a tragic incident hit the family and forced them to move to the city.
Directed by Berkun Oya, Cici is a Turkish family drama starring Turkish actors Fatih Artman, Sevval Balkan, and Ayca Bingol. The movie revolves around a countryside family which reunites after 30 years and discovers the dark secrets behind the family’s tragic past.
Cici Story Summary
In the countryside in the 1970s, a family of five resides. The patriarch of the family, Bekir, is a typical male chauvinist who cares little about his wife and children’s happiness, does not let them go to college and study in the big city, and wants them to stay in the village, managing the farm and cattle and taking care of the parents when they grow old.
He often goes out at night to satiate his sexual desires and takes pride in the fact that he gave his wife three children and has never hit her. Bekir expects his wife to be satisfied with what she is given. He is very strict with his children as well. When his son, Kadir, tries to touch his video camera, he gets beaten by Bekir. Bekir’s only source of entertainment is sitting in front of the television.
However, his wife Havva is the complete opposite. She wants her children to escape the village life and move to the bigger city to study. She is extremely affectionate for her three children – daughter Saliha and sons Kadir and Yusuf. One day, while visiting his friend on his farm, Bekir takes admiration for a boy named Cemil and brings him to his house.
Bekir treats the boy like his own son and even tells his children that Cemil is their brother. But little does he know that Cemil is the secret lover of his daughter Saliha. Saliha and Cemil often meet at night, secretly, until one day Cemil breaks up with Saliha leaving their childhood romance incomplete.
Kadir becomes jealous of Cemil’s presence as Cemil dutifully agrees to whatever Bekir says, and Bekir admires Cemil more than Kadir. One day while Kadir jokingly sprays Cemil with a hosepipe, Bekir notices this and instead sprays Kadir with water, calling it a joke and even recording it on the video camera.
This is witnessed by everyone in the family, and Havva intrudes to stop Bekir. Bekir even punishes Kadir by making him stay outside on a cold winter night. Later that night, Bekir falls asleep while watching television and someone puts the fire out and opens the window, allowing the cold wind to enter the room. Bekir falls ill because of the cold wind and after a few days of being bedridden, he passes away.
In the present time, Kadir, now a filmmaker, is directing a movie at his childhood house and is filming the same scene of a young boy being water sprayed by his father, similar to what his father did to him as a child. His mother, now old and mentally unstable, who is watching the scene, seems disturbed by this and thinks of this as disrespecting his late father.
Havva has grown to love her husband more after his death and breaks down while filming a scene in which she must tend to the actor playing Kadir’s father in the film and ends up slapping Kadir in front of his crew. Due to a fallout between the crew and Kadir and being overcome by the hurtful memories of his childhood, Kadir remains unsuccessful in completing the film.
Cici Ending Explained
Due to the pandemic two years later, all three siblings reunite again at their childhood house where Havva, whose condition has worsened due to dementia, lives with her daughter and her granddaughter Naz. Kadir, now struggling financially and professionally, comes to the house. Yusuf also visits the house along with his wife and son, and a rift between the husband-wife is clearly noticeable.
Kadir and Yusuf want to sell the house to meet their financial requirements, but Saliha is strictly against the proposal. Saliha also meets Cemil and is happy to see him again.
During their stay in their childhood house, the siblings discover many secrets. Saliha discovers the real reason for the end of her relationship with Cemil. She finds out that her mother was the one responsible for it.
Havva wanted her daughter to study in the nursing school but as Saliha was in a relationship with Cemil, she refused to go to the city to study and chose to stay in the village. Havva realized that until she is detached from the village, she will not go to the big city. Therefore, Havva used to remove the stone that Cemil kept on the window as a signal for Saliha to meet in the barn, creating misunderstandings between the two.
This led to a fallout between the lovers, and Saliha finally went to nursing school. Later, she got married and had a daughter but ended up getting divorced because of her feelings for Cemil. Meeting Saliha after years, Cemil tells her that he visited Saliha in the nursing school but could not gather the courage to approach her after seeing her with her smart nursing school friends.
What Does Kadir, Yusuf and Saliha Discover?
During the reunion, Havva’s granddaughter Naz starts searching for the camera in which she had recorded the behind-the-scenes of Kadir’s film. After some searching, she gets her hands on some old tapes. When Naz secretly sees her uncle Kadir’s old tapes, which show Kadir being sprayed by his father, she is reminded of the scene Kadir filmed for his film and things slowly start to fall into place for her.
Naz goes on to confront Kadir about the camera in which she had recorded the BTS of Kadir’s film. Kadir had claimed that he misplaced the camera, but Naz remains unsure whether it was the truth. Naz decides that she must look for other tapes lying in the drawer in Kadir’s room, and she finds the BTS tape.
In the BTS video, while Naz was lovingly recording her grandmother, mother, and herself, Havva suddenly asked for her glasses, prompting Saliha to go to the other room to fetch them. In Saliha’s absence, Havva started randomly mumbling about how she should not have put out the fire and left the window open, but Naz did not understand anything back then since she never saw her grandfather.
Naz realizes that it was her grandmother Havva who had mixed sleeping pills in Bekir’s tea to avenge the behavior he meted out to Kadir by Bekir who left his son out in the cold. Bekir fell asleep after drinking the tea and then she put out the fire and opened the window for the cold wind to enter. Due to this, Bekir fell ill and eventually passed away.
Havva’s intentions were only to teach Bekir a lesson, but she never realized her action would have such dire consequences. She started considering herself as the reason for her husband’s death and her guilty conscience caused her to love Bekir more than she ever did while he was alive. Havva’s guilty conscience was also the reason for her failing mind and stability.
Apart from Naz, this video is also watched by Yusuf and Saliha who are shocked beyond words at the actions of their mother and cannot fathom the truth. Being overcome by his emotions, Yusuf tries to question Kadir about the video as Kadir kept the videotape hidden and the reality behind his father’s death a secret all these years. Kadir knew his siblings would be heartbroken at this revelation.
In the end, while the video of Havva confessing about her actions to Naz runs on the television, an old and mentally unstable Havva walks up to the screen and despises herself for her actions as the memories of the tragic past return to haunt her momentarily.
Cici is now streaming on Netflix.
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