Biyografi Dünyası
My Babies (Yavrularım)

My Babies (Yavrularım) (translated)

Movie · 1984 · 7 people

The 1984 Turkish film Yavrularım ("My Babies") was directed by Bilge Olgaç. A drama of the family and emotional kind, it was shot in color on 35 mm. Hülya Koçyiğit and Çetin Tekindor share the leading roles, and it was Tekindor's first feature film. It adapts the 1983 film Who Will Love My Children? starring Ann-Margret, known in Turkish as Çocuklarımı Kim Sevecek?. Produced by Gülşah Film, it has Selim Soydan as producer.

The story follows a family of five children who have come back to Turkey for good after living abroad. The father becomes unable to work and the household is shaken; some time later the mother, Seher Kaya, falls ill with a terminal disease. Devoted to her husband and children, Seher cannot rest for worry about what will happen to them once she is gone. Before she dies she looks for a new family for each child, struggling for a future she will not see. Hülya Koçyiğit plays Seher and Çetin Tekindor plays Cemal. The cast also includes Nermin Dülger (Safiye), Sonat Bilgin (Ebru), Neslihan Kuru (Aycan), Necdet Türkantoz (the doctor) and Selçuk Yalçıntan (a TRT reporter). Devotion, sacrifice, desperation and love of children run through the film.

Erdoğan Tünaş wrote the screenplay and Ertunç Şenkay was the cinematographer.

DirectorBilge Olgaç
Production companyGülşah Film

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Cast

Hülya Koçyiğit Hülya Koçyiğit Film actor · 78 years old Seher Kaya Çetin Tekindor Çetin Tekindor Actor · 81 years old Cemal Kaya Nermin Dülger Selçuk Yalçıntan Sonat Bilgin Neslihan Kuru Necdet Türkantoz

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Through different eyes

Yeşilçam Nostalgic A viewer raised on the classics, looking for warm storytelling and strong acting.

Eighties Turkish cinema knew how to fit tears and love into the same frame in its stories of motherhood and sacrifice, and Yavrularım is a heartfelt example of that tradition. A mother struck by a terminal illness, searching for new homes for her children, carries one of melodrama's heaviest loads. Bilge Olgaç's direction and Erdoğan Tünaş's screenplay take a story adapted from an American film and make it our own by setting it in the troubles of a family returning from abroad. That it was Çetin Tekindor's first film is a sweet footnote seen from today.

Family Viewer Asks whether the whole household can watch it; cares about humour and heart.

The subject is very heavy: a mother with a terminal illness wonders who will take care of her children after she is gone. For young children, especially those already afraid of losing a parent, it may be too upsetting. For teenagers and adults, it is a strong film about family ties and sacrifice. Keep the tissues close, and put it on knowing it is a tearjerker from start to finish.

History & Society Lens Asks about the period, the social background and what the work reflects.

The return home for good that sets the story going was a familiar experience in 1980s Türkiye: families who had spent years abroad came back and found themselves caught between the life they left and the one they found. Yavrularım localises its American source by moving it onto this ground. With the father unable to work, the whole burden falls on the mother, and Seher's search for a new family for each child also shows how much security rests on family ties. In my view the weight of the melodrama is all too likely to leave these social details in the shadow of the tears; the material could have said more than emotion alone.

These are not reader reviews: they are short editorial takes written from different viewer perspectives with AI assistance. Reader reviews are below.

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