The Long Way Home (2013): cast, story & where to watch

Released in 2013, The Long Way Home is a drama, war and history film directed by Alphan Eşeli, running about 112 minutes.

What it’s about. Inhospitable at the best of times, the snow-covered mountainscapes of Eastern Anatolia constituted a fatal frontier for many war exiles after the battle of Sarikamish in 1915, and provides a canvas laced with beauty and threat for this bone-chilling survival yarn, the superb debut feature of Alphan Eşeli. Starting out with three characters – a refugee mother and daughter and their grizzled guide – the film traces their daunting trek across this barren terrain to safety, with the Russians encroaching and other stragglers, including a pair of wounded, frostbitten Ottoman soldiers, all orbiting the same burnt-out village they find in their path. Puncturing its aura of ghostly impasse with some shocking narrative reversals, and constantly prickling with the mutual dread of strangers in gruelling extremes, the movie stakes out hugely credible ground next to established Eastern Front war classics (In the Fog, Come and See) while remaining thoroughly its own beast. (Source: LFF programme)

Who’s in it. The Long Way Home stars Uğur Polat, Nergis Öztürk, Serdar Orçin and Muharrem Bayrak as Çoban Ali, among others.

How it landed. With an audience score of 6.7/10, The Long Way Home has drawn a solid, mixed-to-positive response.

Where to watch. Streaming options change often. See the full, country-by-country breakdown on our where to watch The Long Way Home page.

If you liked it. Fans of The Long Way Home tend to enjoy The Shawshank Redemption, The Godfather, Schindler's List and The Godfather Part II.