The subdermal anxieties of Istanbul’s middle class are probed and prodded in this wickedly entertaining drama from writer-director Seren Yüce. Despite an admirable life of comfort, fortyish Handan is nagged by a sense of personal underachievement, which she chooses to fix with a new MacBook and the flash decision to become a novelist, like family friend Sinem. Husband Korhan, meanwhile, has his own way of battling midlife ennui—although those dick pics he furtively captures at the office aren’t meant for his wife. Some clunky moments aside, Swaying Waterlily takes vicious delight in putting poor Handan through the wringer. Vanity and an essential lack of substance are her undoing, but she’s cursed with just enough smarts to know when others are twisting their knives. Songül Öden is radiant as the would-be writer (who is smugly reminded by Sinem, on reading a first draft, that waterlilies don’t “sway”), which makes the film even more deliciously painful.

Georgia Straight, June 2017