Although Mustang represents France, it was filmed in Turkish and shot entirely in Turkey. The director, Deniz Gamze Ergüve, was born in Turkey, but has spent most of her life in France. The crew was overwhelmingly French.
Five orphaned sisters are being raised by their grandmother and overseen by their uncle in a village on the Black Sea. The girls are bursting with youthful energy and independence. However these are not qualities that females are supposed to have in this rigid, conservative society. When it becomes clear that the girls are becoming interested in boys and vice-versa, their guardians take action, locking them in their house, taking away their cell phones and makeup and putting bars on the windows. Grandma and Uncle turn their house into a “wife factory,” bringing in various aunts to teach the girls womanly skills and a succession of marriage-ready men. The eldest sister gets to marry her actual boyfriend, but the prospects turn darker and darker for the other sisters.
It is a grim reality that the village elders force upon the sisters, but there is one comic interlude. The girls escape to attend a soccer match with an all-female audience, but, like Laurel and Hardy in Sons of the Desert, they are caught on camera. Fortunately, back home, one of the aunties knocks out the village electricity before the men recognize the girls.
