Mimaroglu: The Robinson of Manhattan Island

A portrait of Ilhan Mimaroglu, the little-known composer of Turkish avant-garde and electronic music, and his wife, Güngör, who was an activist for the American civil rights movement, after emigrating to the country in 1959. The film is built through their home videos and other materials from their personal archives, as well as their reflections and other testimonies, and weaves a life-long adventure marked by companionship.

Ilhan Mimaroğlu, an unknown name from the Turkish electronic scene, is the perfect archetype of the man of his own time: ambitious, curious, self-made, brave beyond borders. Ilhan's story is told by the female voice of his life partner, revealing the life of a composer who reflected on his contemporaneity and how even the least creative human being always evolves in the shadow of his ancestors. Between Turkey and the US, this is the story of the triple suicide of Ilhan’s music — contemporary, electronic and political — as well as its survival through time. (Filipa Henriques)