Midnight Express is a 1978 prison drama film directed by Alan Parker and adapted by Oliver Stone from Billy Hayes's 1977 memoir of the same name. The film centers on Hayes, a young American student, who is sent to a Turkish prison for trying to smuggle hashish out of the country. The film's title is prison slang for his escape attempt. The cast also features Irene Miracle, John Hurt, Bo Hopkins, Paul L. Smith and Randy Quaid.
Edward Albert Arthur Woodward, OBE was an English actor and singer. After graduating from the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, he began his career on stage. Throughout his career, he appeared in productions in both the West End of London and on Broadway in New York City. He came to wider attention from 1967 in the title role of the British television spy drama Callan, earning him the 1970 British Academy Television Award for Best Actor.
William "Billy" Hayes is an American writer, actor, film director and convicted drug smuggler. He is best known for his autobiographical book Midnight Express about his experiences in and escape from a Turkish prison, after being convicted of smuggling hashish. He was one of hundreds of US citizens in foreign jails serving drug charge sentences, following a drug-smuggling crackdown by foreign governments.
Yılmaz Güney 1 April 1937 – 9 September 1984) was a Turkish-Kurdish film director, screenwriter, novelist, actor and communist political activist. He quickly rose to prominence in the Turkish film industry. Many of his works were made from a far-left perspective and devoted to the plight of working-class people in Turkey. Güney won the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival in 1982 for the film Yol which he co-produced with Şerif Gören. He was at constant odds with the Turkish government over the portrayal of Kurdish culture, people and language.
Cinema of Turkey or Turkish cinema, or Türksineması refers to the Turkish film art and industry. It is an important part of Turkish culture, and has flourished over the years, delivering entertainment to audiences in Turkey, Turkish expatriates across Europe, Balkans & Eastern Europe, also more recently prospering in the Arab world and to a lesser extent, the rest of the world.
Fahrettin Cüreklibatır, better known by his stage name Cüneyt Arkın, was a Turkish film actor, director and producer. Having starred in somewhere around 300 movies and TV series, he is widely considered one of the most prominent Turkish actors of all time. Arkın's films have ranged from well-received dramas to mockbusters throughout his career spanning four decades.
İsmail Metin Erksan was a Turkish film director and art historian.
Fatma Girik was a Turkish actress and politician. Together with Hülya Koçyiğit, Filiz Akın and Türkan Şoray, she was an icon for the golden age in Turkish cinematography and is regarded as one of the four most important actresses in Turkish cinema.
Orhan Kemal is the pen name of Turkish novelist Mehmet Reşit Öğütçü. He is known for his realist novels that describe the life of the poor in Turkey.
You Can't Win 'Em All is a 1970 British-American war film, written by Leo Gordon and directed by Peter Collinson. It stars Tony Curtis, Charles Bronson and Michèle Mercier. The film is set at the end of the Greco-Turkish War (1919-1922). Two American mercenaries are forced to serve an Ottoman governor, who wants them to escort his daughters to Cairo. He also wants them to safeguard a treasure.
Tunç Başaran was a Turkish screenwriter, film director, film producer and actor.
Çağan Irmak is a Turkish film and television writer and director, who has managed to attract a large audience in Turkey and is best known for the TV series Çemberimde Gül Oya (2004–2005) and Asmalı Konak (2002–2004), and for the hit films Alone (2008) and My Father and My Son (2005), for which he received Turkish Cinema Writers Association Awards for Best Film, Best Screenplay and Best Director.
Tuncel Tayanç Kurtiz was a Turkish theatre, movie and TV series actor, playwright, and film director. Since 1964, he acted in more than 70 movies, including many international productions.
Ertem Eğilmez was a Turkish film director, producer and screenwriter. He is known as the name behind some of the most popular films in Turkish film history. Many of these were produced by his production company Arzu Film.
Hilal Nebahat Çehre is a Turkish actress, model, singer and beauty pageant titleholder who was crowned Miss Turkey 1960. She is best known for her protagonist roles as Firdevs Yöreoğlu on the Kanal D drama series Aşk-ı Memnu (2008–10) and as Hafsa Sultan on the series Muhteşem Yüzyıl (2011–12).
Events in the year 1970 in Turkey.
İTÜ TV was the first Turkish television station. Its broadcasts began on 9 July 1952, from a station at Istanbul Technical University (İTÜ)'s electrical engineering department. Weekly two-hour broadcasts from İTÜ continued on an experimental basis, but by 1957 there were still fewer than 200 television receivers in Istanbul. The station carried out its broadcasts on VHF channel 4. İTÜ broadcasts continued until 1970, and in 1971 its facilities and equipment were ordered to be transferred to the Turkish Radio and Television Corporation, and İTÜ TV was subsequently shut down.
