Ararat

World War Two is ending. Six terrified young refugees dodge Russian army units and walk to Germany on foot, herding young children along. The kids find a refugee camp run by an Army nurse named Billie. Billie has a grand (and doomed) scheme to use the Red Cross to unite kids with their parents, but she is quickly overwhelmed by the rush of children. And she knows that the kids will end up, orphaned and traumatized, in the hands of terrifying Russian troops who intend to round them up. She is under orders from an American colonel to care for the kids and is given a handful of soldiers to do the job. She asks the older kids to help. But the story is actually told through the eyes of a girl named Salomea. This amazing character transforms from a mute, wild half-animal eating rabbits in the Russian woods, to a witty, romantic girl. And as she is slowly pulled out of her isolation in the woods and deeper into the life of the camp, our view of the entire story changes as we follow her. Picture Millie Bobby Brown with more hair and much better dialogue, and you’ve got Salomea. Two older girls, Anelie and Ewa, help to run the camp and puzzle out the terrible things that happened to the kids. When Salomea begins to help, Anelie and Ewa finally succeed in transforming the children from sad little scarecrows back into kids. Little romances bloom, to include one involving a refugee girl who persuades a Russian soldier (great romantic part) to run away with her. The script has heavier moments: the German POW tells Billie that America could have succumbed to Nazism (which by sheer luck is now very timely), and Ewa’s detective work reveals that one of the girls is a rape survivor. But there is lots of humor as the Polish kids clumsily learn baseball and Billie has a disastrous Polish lesson; a boy named Mateusz tries to romance the stripe-haired Hanna but it goes awry when she sees how he drew her in his comic book. Russian troops, led by a woman named Galina, finally come for the kids but Billie outsmarts them and saves the kids. Then Galina tells the mesmerizing story of the siege of Leningrad, akin to Robert Shaw’s terrifying WWII shark tale in “Jaws”. What begins as a scary confrontation ends as a very emotional moment: Galina finds a dress that would fit have her dead daughter and takes a moment so she can completely fall apart. Galina isn’t a lead role but actresses will kill for this job: someone like Charlize Theron, who can bridge the gap between hard-nosed army officer and grieving mother, would be the perfect fit. This is not, repeat NOT a Holocaust story: no death camps, no ghettos. The main villain is Russian, not German. It is about children and healing, love and inspiration, and it also speaks powerfully about refugees with nowhere to go (also timely). The production should be very cheap. The two coverage editors gave this a “Recommend” and a “Grade A – Strongly Recommend”. Quotes from the coverage: “Ararat” will move audiences. It will make an excellent film: a real crowd pleaser. It is that rare substantive story with broad audience appeal. This is a film someone’s definitely going to make.