(Feature Film)

WRITERS: Charles Levi & Graham Leader

DIRECTOR: Charlie Levi

GENRE: Drama, Romance

SYNOPSIS:

TINIAN is the story of two brothers in their twenties who’verun to the ends of the earth in a futile attempt to lay the family demons torest.

 It is the early ‘70s. The Vietnam War still rages on. Notfar away sits the island of Tinian, which at first glance appears to be apeaceful haven in those troubled times.

 Effie Voss arrived first. He decided this was the perfectplace for him to write undisturbed, though he must have known that Tinian,famous as the launching site for the Enola Gay’s flight to Hiroshima, hadghosts of its own. He has since been joined by his childhood girlfriend, Helen.

 The film begins with the arrival of his younger brother, Paul,who has come from their home in Georgia to spend a few weeks with the twopeople he’s been smitten by his whole life. Paul gets off the boat full of hopeand dazzled by the tropical exoticism of this very foreign place.

 It doesn’t take long before a local cockfight reveals theseamier underside of paradise, and signs of trouble with the family reunion areeven quicker to appear. Paul soon realizes that Effie’s letters home had beenmisleadingly buoyant, his work has been fitful, and even his relationship withHelen is dangerously fragile – held together more by memories of infatuationthan by any real functioning love. Effie is a brilliant bundle of wounds whotreats those around him like bloodied bandages ready to be discarded. Sometimeshe seems a prisoner of his pain, other times he appears to enjoy the license itgives him to lash out.

 Paul had come hoping for a youthful celebration and nowfinds himself facing the first real challenge of his adulthood. His arrival hasreminded Effie not of happier times but, instead, of everything he’d run awayfrom. Now each attempt by Paul to reach out to his brother seems to backfire.Effie reacts by going on a wildly self-destructive binge, as if to prove thathe’s unhelpable.

 Paul and Helen work together to try and save Effie, but thistoo has unforeseen complications. Effie sets fuses everywhere, and time beginsto run down - both love and murder claim victims along the way.

 Amidst the quickening action, Paul must sort out his ownneeds and motivations.  Somehow hehas to parse the family mythology while fighting for his life. Eventually, hemust choose between his brother’s future and his own.

STATUS: Script