IN OFFICIAL SELECTION 'IVAN & MARIA' WRITTEN BY MOHYDEEN QUANDOUR

BIO:

Mohydeen Izzat Quandour began his creative career in New York with J.W.T and MPO Studios.

Later he moved to Hollywood after sale of his first novel “Skyjack” to 20th Century Fox in 1970 and joined the WGA West as a screenwriter and became Film/TV director. Quandour is a novelist (with 14 historical novels published in Europe, Russia and USA. Ten of these novels were translated into Arabic and are published out of Lebanon. All the titles are available on amazon.com and Barns & Noble. Quandour is also a classical music composer whose recent works are being performed in Russia, Japan and in many European venues. (see youtube downloads under Quandour).

-1962-1964 Started film work in advertising with J. Walter Thompson Company, New York as assistant producer, then producer/director. Produced/directed several commercials for JWT clients in cosmetics (Clairol, Johnson & Johnson etc.). Produced/directed many industrial documentaries and commercials.
-1964-1968 Worked with MPO Studios in New York on promotion films and documentaries. (12 documentaries for Readers Digest alone).
-1970-1974 Quandour worked in Hollywood on several Television series (Mannix, Bonanza) and produced/directed 4 feature films, “Yanco” (Cherobusco, Mexico). “Cherokee”, “Cold Wind” and “The Spectre of Edgar Allan Poe”.
-1976-1986 Produced several Documentary series including

Wilderness Passage”, “Musical Journeys”, “The Last Horsemen”.

- Since the early nineties Quandour has been writing novels and composing classical music. He recently (2005/06) produced/directed the film “Lost in The Mountains” in Russia, a German/Russian co-production for which he also wrote the musical sound-track). He is president and partner in the new film production company Sindika Productions. (www.sindikaproductions.com) .

- His most popular literary works are 'The Kavkas Trilogy' (Bestseller in the Russian Federation), 'Revolution', 'The Last Hunt', and his latest publication is the novel 'Iraq-Desert Crossroads' published in hard cover in the UK and paperback in the USA (2008).

Quandour has been involved in many creative spheres. An English language Russian website is available on www.cherkessfund.org which details most of his creative works and productions. Quandour divides his residence between Windsor, England and Amman Jordan.

LOGLINE:

" A passionate love story between a stupendous Circassian beauty (Maria) and the schizophrenic Ivan the Terrible. Together they unite a vast chaotic realm into a Russian Empire, overcoming Kremlin intrigues and assassination attempts. But this love ends in tragedy with the poisoning of Maria and her sons by her Kremlin enemies."

Synopsis::

Russia, 1561. TSAR IVAN IV (THE TERRIBLE) is a sadistic brute. He is also a scholar, religious devotee, paranoid schizophrenic and a sex maniac. And Ivan is at war. Poland-Lithuania, his enemies to the northwest and the Crimean Tatars, his enemies to the south, threaten to dismantle the fragile empire Ivan is trying to assemble through a combination of brute force, diplomacy and marriage. But his most dangerous enemies are Russian. Two princely clans, the Yurievs and the Staritskii maneuver against the Tsar – and each other -- to sow discord among the aristocracy and line up support for a coup.

And the church, under ARCHBISHOP MAKARII, constantly interferes with Ivan’s arbitrary and brutal manner of dealing with the princes and the Boyars.But the Tsar has a secret weapon. His second wife, MARIA, a passionate, stupendous beauty from the Caucasus, pledges her allegiance only to Ivan, and they adore each other, in spite of Kremlin intrigues and Ivan’s serial infidelities.

Under Ivan and Maria, Russia expands its borders, introduces printing and builds a powerful economy linking the Far East with Europe. But when Maria sees the princes getting traction on their plans to overthrow Ivan, she encourages him to abdicate the throne, to go before the common people who adore him, and blame the princes.The peasants predictably revolt, take out their anger on the princes, who have no choice but to come before Ivan with Makarii and beg him to return to the throne – on his terms. Ivan agrees, but things will be different now. He divides the country’s leaders into two classes: the trusted Oprichnina, which he leads; and the Zemschina. The black-clad Oprichnina operate as a law unto themselves, arresting, trying and punishing supposed traitors and their retinue in ways too grotesque to imagine.

Fueled by his increasingly serious bouts of paranoid schizophrenia, Ivan imagines enemies everywhere -- sweeps the country up in a maelstrom of unspeakable cruelty. The church and the Zemschina fail at every attempt to rein in the increasingly unstable, increasingly violent Tsar.

Maria is the only one who can soothe the raging beast. And she becomes the focus of those who would seek to bring instability to the regime by any means. Her death by poison and that of their infant son, usher in perhaps the bloodiest period in all Russian history.