Baskin (2015) Review: Movie Explained!

This mythological thriller/horror film from Turkey offers irrepressible terror wrapped in mystery. The beauty of this gory, biblical dream-ride is how much it provides with such a thin plot. The story is about a bunch of cops, who while trying to explore an abandoned police station, experience perdition in its ultra-violent ways.

[Tweet “”It is a very personal movie. It probably stems from my early childhood.” ~ Can Evrenol”]

After trying his hand at quite a few short horror movies, director Can Evrenol marks his silver screen debut with Baskin, based on 10 minutes short of the same name. He put his heart and soul into this somewhat precarious venture. It’s not easy to bind myths, terror, and enigma in a single narrative within a cocoon of entertainment. But Evrenol does it with elan. Being a horror movie buff, some French horror movies worked as his inspiration in creating this masterpiece. He shot the whole film in just 28 nights with an Arri Amira. In spite of the tight budget and novice cast, Evrenol managed to pull off his project triumphantly.

Baskin (2015) Trailer

About the cast: Due to budget constraint, Evrenol could not manage to rope in established actors, so he was compelled to engage an ensemble cast, who were absolutely newcomers. But these actors, with their relentless efforts and raw talent, helped Baskin to achieve its true essence. The show stealer was definitely Mehmet Cerrahoglu, the actor, who effortlessly personated Baba. Mehmet, the 40-year-old car park attendant in real life, is suffering from a very rare medical condition, which caused his deformity. He is definitely an amazing discovery of the filmmaker.

Baskin (2015): Movie Explained!

The level of ambiguity this film carries makes it absurdly difficult to provide an overall explanation. So, I have decided to dissect every scene, which deserves some kind of elucidation. The opening scene of Baskin is inspired by a nightmare, which Evrenol’s father often experienced as a child. This scene is used quite a few times throughout the movie. It leaves us with two questions, was the whole story just a mere nightmare of Arda or was Arda actually Devil’s own son? I will try to figure out the most plausible answer through decrypting the myths and symbols.

This bucket full of meat delivered to the guy at the restaurant surely looks abhorrent. Probably it was the same meat, which was extracted from the rotten bodies of the police station. And the hooded figure carrying this was presumably Baba’s sidekick.

This scene, where the man puked and found a frog in the soap holder, and Baba’s faint image at the backdrop clearly give an indication that the restaurant was also an extension of Hell (police station). It can also be the premonitions of their future happenings.

In an interview Can Evrenol decrypted this goat-faced woman sex scene: “This element of sexuality reflects the male-dominated society in the areas where I was born and raised.” The different sexual scenes reflect some ambiguous carnal cult.

Baskin (2015) – Ending Explained!

Now before trying to deduce the climax, we need to bring forth some theories. The first thought which crossed my mind after completing the whole movie was, “Is Arda Devil’s son?” The seed of this idea rests in the opening scene. Was his mother having sex with the Devil? Was the nightmare actually a figment of the truth, which recurred to him multiple times? The bedroom was lit with red light, did it indicate Hell? Another supposition is the ‘loop theory.’ It is very much possible that Arda and all the other cops were caught in a time-loop. They underwent those torments again and again until Arda destroyed Baba and his curse.

The last hypothesis is probably the most accurate one. Here I am assuming that the story starts with the death of Arda and other cops due to drowning and the whole build-up is apparently bits and pieces of their past life and their actual hellish experience at Baba’s lair.

This genre-busting biblical horror/thriller is so ambivalent, that it is almost impossible to analyze this movie based on any particular slant. It will brutally play with your sanity and will leave you flabbergasted. You can’t ignore this layered, somewhat non-linear film, as it deserves and demands your attention for being one of the best foreign horror movies of this decade.

We watched this movie long back by downloading, but right now, you can browse on Netflix, Amazon Prime or even MUBI, you can watch this online by streaming with English Subtitles. This is our Baskin movie analysis and summary, if you want to share your insights and thoughts, do kindly let us know in the comments!

This article is written by Satakshi Banerjee, a devoted cinephile, who loves to explore unsung and underrated Indian or foreign movies. She is the Editor of FilmSpell, a diverse and bottomless well of information about movies.