588 rue paradis (1993)
Directed by Henri Verneuil

Film Synopsis

It has been forty years since Azad Zakarian, then just a boy, fled Armenia and settled in France with his family.  Thanks to his parents' selfless devotion to him, Azad has had the best education a boy of his age could hope to get himself and now he is a prominent writer, better known by his pseudonym Pierre Zakar.  He leads a comfortable and contented life with his wife Carole, whom he met on the banks of Lake Geneva.  Throughout his life, Azad has been haunted by his childhood recollections.  He was only six when he left Armenia, but his flight from Turkish oppression is still etched on his mind.  Now in his mid-forties, he feels up to the task of writing a play inspired by his earliest memories.  Entitled La Chevalière, the play will allow the writer to reconnect with his roots and reaffirm his Armenian identity.

As rehearsals for the play get underway at a Paris theatre, Azad invites his father Hagop to the capital to attend the performance, putting him up in a posh hotel.  Hagop has aged considerably since his son last saw him and he is looking for more warmth than Azad is capable of offering him.  A silly misunderstanding results in the two men falling out.  As the disappointed old man heads back to his home in Marseille, Azad is left feeling that he has let him down.  This was not what he intended.  Azad's sense of guilt is worsened when his father dies not long afterwards.  Through his highly emotional reunion with his mother, the writer experiences another rush of memories which will inspire him in his future work...