Crossing Silver Screens: Transcultural Resonance of Die drei von der Tankstelle (1930) & Le chemin du paradis (1930) in Early Republican Turkey

This article examines how multiple-language version (MLVs) Tonfilmoperetten acquired meaning through exhibition and reception practices in early Republican Turkey, particularly in Istanbul. Focusing on Die drei von der Tankstelle and its French-language counterpart Le chemin du paradis, the article traces their circulation between 1930 and 1936. Drawing on archival materials and contemporary press coverage, and treating newspaper advertisements as evidence of exhibition practices, the article argues that these films functioned as transnational media events in which language, stardom, and genre operated not as separate factors but as an integrated system of cultural mediation shaping audience interpretation. In an environment shaped by linguistic reform and cultural change, sound film-operettas provided musical and generic forms through which audiences engaged with the films, where linguistic comprehension functioned as only one among several competing interpretive frameworks. By foregrounding the microhistory of MLVs and treating Istanbul as more than a peripheral market and instead as a site where the tensions and possibilities of early sound cinema became visible, the article contributes to the fields of transnational film studies, film reception studies, and scholarship on early sound cinema.