AN ISLAND APART BY PAUL G. ANDREWS AND TASHA WALTON
Written by William Stancik / Reviewed by Riya Saha THE STRUGGLES BETWEEN THE TURKISH CYPRIOTS AND GREEK CYPRIOTS FOR THE RIGHT TO GOVERN THEMSELVES AND EACH OTHER DATES BACK DECADES... CENTURIES EVEN. An Island Apart written by Paul G. Andrews and Tasha Walton is a Tragic Love Story that relates the story of two friends and their love for a pretty Greek Cypriot girl ELENI. The screenplay starts wherein 2010, aging Turkish Cypriot EMRE is thrown into despair when his son is shot by police in a failed bank robbery which he has staged as a last-ditch attempt to provide for his young family. Watching the events unveil on television is GIORGOS, an elderly Greek Cypriot and Emre’s oldest but estranged friend. Young Emre and Giorgos are firm friends in 1956; both working for Emre’s father, BILAL, at his petrol station, when they meet,. The three of them develop a bond lasting well into their teens, but when the shooting of four innocent Turkish Cypriots in Nicosia causes Bilal to forbid his son from having anymore contact with his friends, they are torn apart. Emre one way, Eleni and Giorgos the other. The writers came up with an idea for a dark love story, which has some heart-wrenching ingredients you must throw into the plot. To me the story of the screenplay intrigues me, it has the perfect main characters and of course the story the work as it has the perfect explanation of grief. Losing love and losing a young child in the old age. Coming to the plot of the story during their young age, Emre finds a way to smuggle letters to Eleni for whom he finally declares his love, but for years this is their only means of contact, and when Giorgos is welcomed into Eleni’s family as an ally of her brother MANOLIS and his EOKA friends, she is forced into a relationship with him instead. Despite her platonic love for Giorgos, her heart belongs to Emre and they arrange to run away together in the night. At their secret meeting place, Eleni waits while Emre fetches their getaway car, completely unaware that Giorgos, Manolis, and their comrades are planning an attack on the known Turkish Resistance rendezvous. The building she is hiding in is blown up, and the two young men who have loved her since she was ten are left grief-stricken and blaming each other for her untimely death. I was sad that both of them who loved a single girl lost their love but intrigued at the idea of what the writers created next. The pacing helped in creating the intensity of the script. Paul G. Andrews and Tasha Walton, both are very creative writers and created the characters with perfection because it is a tragic love story. Giorgos works his way up the hierarchy of EOKA. While his friend is finally persuaded to join the Turkish Cypriot resistance, developing his guerrilla warfare tactics in the hopes of coming face to face with Giorgos once more. Though Emre joins the movement in mind he was planning to kill his friend as he blamed him for Elini’s death. Emre follows his old friend to the cemetery and is shocked when he sees Giorgos collapse in grief at Eleni’s graveside. Emre changes his mind and lets Giorgos go. As the violence on the island subsides and government talks take over, Giorgos settles into a lonely life of politics. As a terminally ill old man, he peruses the photos of his happy childhood with Emre and Eleni but pushes his emotions aside and switches on his television. The structure of the screenplay the plots and subplots of the story create an emotional adventure that will be experienced by the audience as entertainment - all of which will arise when you make the screenplay turn into a movie. The narrative structure, of the screenplay, governs how the story is told - the arrangement of the incidents, the sequence of events, the emphasis each dimension or quality is given - the central event, character and action comprise the focus of the story. All these factors have contributed to not only making the story unique but also adding clarity and meaning - and also power and magic. I Like To Mention The CLOSING CREDITS: ‘Centuries ago Cyprus was divided by the different cultures who called the island home... These divisions hit their peak in the 20th century... Leading to the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus separating from southern Cyprus ... though it remains unrecognized internationally. And to this day... keeps the island apart.’
