Two filmmakers in Los Angeles, U.S., Edwin Avaness and Serj Minassians, have committed themselves to the creation of a feature length documentary on Edward Minasyan’s book “Musa Dagh”, which is about the events and personalities involved in the saga of 74 year struggle to make a movie based on Franz Werfel’s novel, The Forty Days of Musa Dagh.
According to epicdenied.com, Edward Minasyan first read The Forty Days of Musa Dagh as a nineteen year old serving in World War II. That experience, combined with discovering more about his own family history as survivors of the Armenian Genocide, led him to the life-long search for answers.
His book, Musa Dagh, traces the trials and tribulations of Franz Werfel’s The Forty Days of Musa Dagh in Hollywood. The book is an original work and the first to deal with the historic controversy on Werfel’s masterpiece stirred since its publication in the United States in 1934. The sight of maimed and famished Armenian refugee children working in a Damascus carpet factory in 1929 gave Werfel the impetus to write his masterwork novel, The Forty Days of Musa Dagh. During his research of British, French, German and Austrian documents about the Armenian massacres, Werfel came across an incident describing the Armenian defense at Musa Dagh in 1915. Rather than accede to the Ottoman Turkish government’s demand to “relocate” to the Syrian desert, 5,000 Armenians chose to defend themselves atop Musa Dagh. Seizing upon this event, Werfel wrote a powerful historical novel which became an instant best seller in Europe and the United States in 1934-1935.
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), the most powerful movie studio in the world, purchased the rights with the intent to make it into a major motion picture. The film project was subjected to protests by the Turkish government. Pressure was applied by Turkey on the U.S. State Department to influence the Hays Office (Hollywood’s censor bureau) to exhort MGM to cancel the film production. Until today it has become the most on-again and off-again motion picture production in Hollywood history. This book is thoroughly documented based on research in the MGM archives and the U.S. State Department, the Franz Werfel Papers at the UCLA Special Collections Library, the American Film Institute, and interviews of personalities involved in the film project. The basic components of historical research are covered in a manner that finally unveils-the truth of a film denied.
The two filmmakers, Edwin Avaness and Serj Minassians, write on their website that they are confident that with their experience and a solid list of committed experts on the subject matter, they will be able to tell a compelling story and unveil the truth behind an epic that was denied numerous opportunities to see its glory on the silver screen.
The objective of the “Epic Denied. Depriving the forty days of Musa Dagh” is to give audiences a unique look at the controversy surrounding the novel The Forty Days of Musa Dagh, and the unprecedented political maneuverings by foreign forces to halt the production of the motion picture. The documentary will explore such factors as conspiracy, complicity, collusion, and blatant censorship in the context of Hollywood’s history and infringement of the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution by a foreign power.
“We believe this is an important part of the Motion Picture history, and we need your help to document it”, write the filmmakers.
But in order to make this movie a reality, the filmmakers are collecting 120000 $, so that the movie can enter the phase of production.
You can make your contributions visiting their website http://www.indiegogo.com/EpicDenied
For more information visit :
http://www.epicdenied.com/EPIC_DENIED/PROJECT.html
