The Festival of Troubadours is a Turkish drama that follows the story of a father and son who reunite after twenty-five years and their journey to the music festival of troubadours. The movie is now streaming on Netflix.
Warning: This article contains heavy spoilers
Plot summary
After 25 years, Yusuf’s father unexpectedly knocks on his door on a rainy night after paying a visit to his wife’s grave. Ali apologises to his son for bothering him and informs him that he’ll be heading to Arkanya the following day to take care of a few things before heading to Kars.
Seeing his father’s deteriorating condition, the following morning, Yusuf inquires about his medical condition and discovers that his father has visited nearly every hospital in the country and recently left the hospital in the middle of his treatment. His sickness has spread throughout his body, including his bones.
Yusuf is concerned about his father’s bad condition, but he knows he will be unable to persuade his father, who is simply too stubborn. Yusuf hurries to stop his father from leaving town, but he has already left without saying anything, which enrages Yusuf because he has no idea what his father is chasing this time.
He decides to drive his father to Arkanya himself after chasing the bus. Yusuf confronts his father about his terrible sickness and requests that he seek treatment from his doctor friend, but his father refuses, claiming that the therapies will be ineffective and that he is living on borrowed time.
All his father wants to do is attend the troubadours festival and see his friends. Yusuf attempts to reconnect with his father, who hasn’t contacted him in 25 years and has never expressed concern for him.
Along the journey, old feelings are resurfaced as the father and son duo come to terms with the time they didn’t get to spend together. When his father’s illness deteriorates more, Yusuf brings him to the hospital.
When Ali starts to feel a little better, he calls his old friend Sergeant Bekir to come to the hospital, and they decide to spend the night at his house, while Yusuf makes the decision to see his friend Dilek, whom he hasn’t met in many years, and spend the night drinking with her.
The Festival of Troubadours ending explained in detail:
Why does Ali want to go to the festival of troubadours?
Ali is a well-known travelling traditional music maestro who carries the beauty and grace of Turkish folk music with him everywhere he goes.
Because of his health issues, Ali plans to visit his son for the first time in 25 years and then go to the festival of troubadours in Kars because he knows he doesn’t have much longer.
At the music festival, troubadours from all around the country assemble every year to perform, sing, and engage in battle. Ali doesn’t want to pass up this opportunity to attend the festival and bid his friends farewell.
Who is Zere?
On their way to Kars, his father requests Yusuf to drop him off at his friend’s house so that he can see him one last time. They spend the night singing and dancing as Ali sings Turkish folk songs.
Later that night, Ali goes to see Zere because she used to be madly in love with him and they used to perform songs he wrote for her together. Zere recalls Ali falling in love with another woman and beginning to sing beautiful melancholy songs for her.
Ali apologises to Zere for making her miserable as she waited for him all these years and bids her goodbye.
Does Ali attend the festival of troubadours?
When they arrive in Arkanya, Ali joins the troubadours, while Yusuf departs to visit his client in the prison facility. On his way back, he gets a call concerning his father, who is in the intensive care unit.
When Ali is on a ventilator Yusuf gets heartbroken when he discovers that his father is still carrying an old portrait of them together. Even though Ali is in critical condition, he still wishes to travel to Kars to attend the troubadours festival and say goodbye to his friends.
Yusuf asks his friend Salim for assistance in arranging a private ambulance for him, and they all travel to Kars. When they finally arrive in Kars, the troubadours greet Ali and start playing the baglama for him. As his condition deteriorates, they decide to return to the hospital, but Ali dies on the way.
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