Genre: Biography. Court Drama. History.
Logline: Based on the astonishing true story of Armen Tehlirian, blatant racism is sweeping across 1920’s Germany, but irony rules in Berlin when a mass-murdering Turkish leader hiding there after World War I, is gunned down by one of the few survivors of the 1915 genocide the Turk had engineered. And, after a sensational trial followed around the world, the survivor-turned-assassin is acquitted of all charges by a German jury, despite his full confession!
Quick Pitch
Official court records and world news accounts from early 1920’s Germany reveal the truth about the cold-blooded murder of the Ottoman Empire’s most powerful leader from World War I, “Young Turk” Mehmet Talaat Pasha. It is a double-dose of irony when Armen Tehlirian survives the near-extermination of the Armenian race in 1915 by Talaat’s barbaric Young Turk triumvirat. Then, 12 years old, Armen survives his death march through the Turkish-Syrian desert only to be machine-gunned into a pit at the end. Seriously wounded, somehow Tehlirian lives and is able to dig his way out of a pile of half-buried corpses. From there he is found by Bedouins and grows into a fierce commando fighter.
Over the next 6 years Tehlirian leads a suspense-filled life underground, fighting the Ottomans to re-establish Armenian independence, while never giving up his search for the architect of the genocide, Talaat. On the witness stand, Tehlirian recounts how he finally locates the murdering Talaat in Berlin where he fled after losing the war on Germany’s side, and he relives his years of struggle plus his methodical stalking of the Turk, and the detailed plans to execute him. Finally, he describes step by step how he approaches and guns down the maniacal Talaat on a dark Berlin street.
Incredibly, during the rise of open racism, and despite a full confession of stalking and killing Talaat, the tortured genocide survivor is cleared of all charges by the German jury after a stunning trial. The events are corroborated by police reports, eyewitness testimony, many concurrent newspaper articles and almost-impossible-to-find court records that were recently obtained, and describe the whole true account of the Armenian patriot and/or “assassin,” Armen Tehlirian, with facts verified and story rights secured.
