The Turkish Coffee Table Review (Frightfest Halloween)
Can Evrenol reworks and relocates black comedy The Coffee Table, making it meaner, bloodier, and even darker than the infamous original.
New dad Iฬbrahim feels emasculated by his control-freak wife, Zehra. A young baby has changed their dynamic, leaving the door open for petty squabbling and disruptive power struggles.
When Iฬbrahim sets eyes on an obviously garish coffee table, he decides to make its ostentatious prancing horses a hill to die on and buys it despite his wife’s apparent disdain. The pushy saleswoman promises the piece will bring good luck and happiness to the family, but nothing could be further from the truth.
Already the victim of a deluded blackmail plot by a young neighbour, Iฬbrahim’s life is about to escalate from downtrodden self-pity to the bleak stratosphere of utter despair and blind panic.
Prepare to be pulverised by the grisly curveballs of The Turkish Coffee Table. If you haven’t seen the original, then be safe in the knowledge that you are getting a deeper emotional mauling than those who have. Evrenol’s irresistibly savage revenge picture,ย Syara, was a delirious delve into utter nihilism, yet here it is hope that kills, even whenย that hope is cloaked in denial.
Director Evrenol has squeezed the gruelling drama and raw pain through the machinery of his deranged imagination. His typically direct approach ramps up the assaulted sensibilities by tempering the farcical humour and maximising the graphic carnage. He funnels the tension into an overflow of distress by turbo-charging the traditional stages of bereavement in a raucous megamix of tense psychological fuckery.
Once again, Evrenol draws grounded performances from his eclectic cast in a story that demands both courageous career choices and nuanced craft. It takes bravery to grapple with such an incendiary and triggering narrative on both sides of the camera.
The two leads are expertly played with pathos, vulnerability and misplaced determination channelled into authentic cultural nuances. Alper Kul gives Iฬbrahim just enough charm and charisma to make his degeneration into a soul-destroyed husk terrifyingly believable. The stunning Algi Eke teases a tinge of playfulness glimmering within Zehra’s brackish aura, suggesting warmth beneath the harsh veneer. Together, they have a stubborn chemistry that dissolves abrasion into tenderness.
Stripping back the original’s dominant comedic tone leaves the film exponentially open to sensationalism and grief tourism. However, it owns the exploitation with a mature gusto that issues its audience a remit to challenge their own complicity in the lure of feel-bad movies. Rest assured that almost anything fucking up your happy existence will be well North of the abject heartbreak that befalls the family in this film.
Confrontational on several levels, this absurdist nightmare redefines what is fair game in both comedy and genre expectations. It’s a movie made with confidence and a conviction in a personal vision, and it comes with a hefty warning for sensitive viewers.
Can Evrenol‘s next movie is a sexually explicit raid on the French New Wave with Beril_XXX. This prospectย is simultaneously delicious and unsettling, and it’sย also the best way to describe The Turkish Coffee Table.
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UK Premiere at Halloween FrightFest 2025 on Nov 1st / ย Hatice Aslan, Algi Eke, Elif Sevinรง, รzgรผr Emre Yildirim / Dir: Can Evrenol
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