A young reporter looking to make her way in the male-dominated world of 1950s journalism gets lucky when she’s assigned to profile ROBERT CAPA, Jewish refugee turned international celebrity war photographer. But as she gets to the bottom of his life of action and romance, she realizes the truth of his life’s trajectory may be blurrier than she at first thought.

-Finalist Black List/MGM Feature Partnership

-Developed and written during the Cannes Screenwriting Residency, hosted by StudioCanal and Vivendi

SYNOPSIS:

Omaha Beach. D-Day. Machine gun fire rips through the air. Mortar shells make sudden craters in the sand. Bodies float in the shallow water. In the middle of it all, a man armed with nothing but a camera snaps photos every chance he can. An excited voice cuts in, narrating the action, “He charges forward, diving into a hole!” We cut to a London magazine office. Olivia is hearing the story told by her editor. She’s a young writer, getting her assignment run-down – a profile on famous war photographer Robert Capa for the tenth anniversary of the Normandy landings and his iconic photos. She’ll travel to Paris, meeting Capa at his de facto home in the luxurious Lancaster Hotel, shadowing him for three days. It’s a big story, but the senior staff’s all busy on assignment or out on Easter holiday, and they must catch Capa before he ships off on another daring mission. Her editor gives her a dossier on Capa – articles, interviews, and some glossy full-sized prints of his iconic shots. His only advice – Capa’s a bit of a partier, so try to keep up, and bring some aspirin for the hangovers.

Olivia is soft-spoken and reserved, but determined to push forward in her career and have her voice heard. Her fiancé Michael is disappointed she’ll miss an Easter lunch with his parents. She explains that this is her chance to prove she can write more than just light puff pieces. A profile on a journalism legend can really prove her mettle. Michael is worried; he doesn’t like the idea of Olivia spending so much time with Capa, a well-known ladies man, in such a romantic and liberated city as Paris. She balks at the idea. On her way out the door, he gives one plea, “We need to start planning the wedding.” It’s evidently something Olivia has been avoiding. She hedges and rushes out to catch the Night Ferry to Paris.

Crammed into her cabin, Olivia forgoes sleep to instead pore over her documents on Capa, but she passes out, finding herself in an intense dream where she’s on the Normandy beachhead alongside Capa, bullets flying all around. The beach starts to morph and change shape – it’s now dark and cold, she’s caged in by concrete walls and a low ceiling. The world shakes and roars from above. She wakes up in Paris. She ventures into the city completely exhausted, hauling her bags across town in a daze. She arrives at her hotel to find it’s much cheaper than the luxurious Lancaster her editor boasted about. She rushes over to meet Capa in the lobby of his hotel as planned, but he’s nowhere to be found. Aggravated, but trying to keep her cool, she asks the front desk to call his room, but discovers he’s left a note to meet him at a nearby café instead.

At the café, she finds Capa playing a pinball machine while flirting with a waitress. He’s a mix of charming Lothario and bohemian artist. After a sheepish introduction and a bit of prodding, Olivia gets him to sit down at a table for the task at hand. Capa raises an eyebrow as she unloads her dossier of documents and photos onto the table. “I’ve been interrogated by government officials with less evidence,” he quips, but we sense a hint of respect at her preparation. Olivia starts her line of questions at the beginning - she has a rough timeline of events, but there are some gaps along the way. Capa dismisses it as part of the war; lots of documents have gone missing. He gives a brief summary of his early life, visualized for us in a quick montage sequence of young-Capa’s refugee existence: He was raised in Budapest, but fled from Admiral Horthy’s dictatorship and rampant anti-Semitism when he was 18. He then travelled to Berlin where he learned photography, but was again forced to flee from the rise of Hitler and Nazism. Next, he ventured to France, where he worked his way up from darkroom assistant to photographer, with his career taking him from Spain to China, to Africa, and onward to today. Olivia jots it in her notebook, but something doesn’t sit right. His story’s too clean, too memorized, too easy. They’re interrupted by Capa’s friend and business partner, David ‘Chim’ Seymour, asking Capa to come up to the offices of Magnum, their photography agency, to sign insurance papers for his next assignment. At Magnum, as Capa is busy, Olivia questions Chim, “I knew him when he was still named André,’ Chim jokes. He can tell Olivia doesn’t understand. “I take it he never discussed our early days in Paris? Our gang, his girlfriend, it was a very desperate but creative time,” he reminisces. Olivia feels embarrassed and naïve, Capa’s already withholding information from her. Capa returns, but before Olivia can confront him, she’s in-tow to another piece of ‘important business’ – the racetrack.

Horses tear down the track at Longchamp Racecourse, and Olivia goes back on the attack with her questioning. “I want the full story, André.” We flashback to Paris 1936 at the Café du Dôme, the renowned Left Bank hangout for artists and philosophers. Capa (now André) is bemoaning to Chim how he must get his Leica out of the pawnshop in time to photograph an upcoming bicycle race. They go to André’s apartment, a bare-bones studio with a slight view of the Eiffel Tower. Chim looks over André’s prints in a makeshift darkroom in the apartment’s bathroom. André’s girlfriend Gerda arrives – redheaded, sassy, and strong-willed – she tells him the photo agency she works for is interested in more ‘Capas.’ They sort through 8x10 prints, while Capa fills in the details to Olivia. In those days, he was André Friedmann. As an unknown photographer, André couldn’t get anyone to buy his work. So André and Gerda created a scam, inventing an enigmatic, constantly travelling, daring American photographer named Robert Capa, selling his photos off of that mystique. André would pose as Capa’s darkroom assistant, while Gerda was his secretary. The scam netted them double what André could get for his prints, and sold much more often. Gerda and André take portfolio to her boss, but their scam is caught when she notices one of the photos as an old one from André’s portfolio he submitted months before. After a tense moment, the agent offers a contract for “André, Capa, whatever you want to be called.” That’s when he officially took on the Capa name and started his career.

Next, Capa puts Olivia to a little test, pushing her out of her comfort zone even more. Olivia must meet Capa at an obscure location, following his obtuse directions across the unfamiliar city. After some false starts, tricky situations, and disastrous run-ins, Olivia makes it to a tucked away basement shop where Capa is being fitted for a suit. He’s delighted to see she’s made it, declaring, “Now you’ve earned your dinner!”

Capa takes Olivia to dinner at the Hotel Scribe, another classically extravagant spot. They have no reservation, but Capa charms the maître d’ into giving them a prime table. Olivia marvels, never expecting such high-end treatment, referencing the cheap hotel she’s staying in. She tries to steer the conversation toward work, asking Capa about the Normandy landings. What made him take the dangerous mission? Capa shrugs, blaming it on the fact that he’s a gambler. By that point in his career he was known for taking dangerous missions and getting closer shots than anyone else. “It’s not as if there’s some allure to the whisper of a sniper’s bullet,” Capa explains. He learned to compartmentalize his fear, to use it as a guide. His first famous photo, the Falling Soldier, was shot with him holding his camera above his head – he demonstrates with a dinner roll, holding it high above his head ‘CLICK!’ We’re taken to a muddy trench in Cerro Muriano, Spain, 1936. Capa and a few soldiers are pinned down by machine gun fire. At a lull in the action, one makes a break for it, leaping over the top of the trench, another follows behind, then another. Capa raises his camera in quick bursts, until he unintentionally captures the moment of a man’s death. We freeze in the still of the Falling Soldier a beat, and then return to Capa as the man falls back into the trench. Capa stares at his lifeless corpse, rattled. “You have to spend a lot of time in trenches to get a photo like that. It’s a habit I’m trying to lose.” Olivia asks about Capa’s next assignment. It’s another war, covering the French conflict in Vietnam. It’s his first war in five years, and his friends don’t want him to go, but there’s something pulling him towards it. Capa then turns the tables on Olivia, asking her questions about herself. They chat about her fiancé, her family, and living through the Blitz as a child. The Blitz lights Capa up, remarking how civilians often rally together the most in war. Olivia tries to steer back to the task at hand, but Capa keeps her in the spotlight. She confesses being at a crossroads in life, wanting to move up at work, but at the same time Michael wants her to settle down. She can see upsides to either, but is worried she can’t do both. Their dinner is interrupted when a large bearded man cheerily roughhouses with Capa in the dining room – it’s famous author Ernest Hemingway. Olivia is a bit star-struck as the two settle down and exchange pleasantries. After he leaves, Olivia kicks herself that she wasn’t brave enough say anything to Hemingway, saying he’s one of her favorite authors. Capa brags that he was with Hemingway in Spain, but it seems lost on Olivia, swimming in her own thoughts.

That night, Olivia returns to her hotel room, finding a note by the room phone. She’s missed calls from her editor and fiancé Michael. She calls her editor first, discussing the assignment. Olivia worries about getting the truth from Capa; he’s already been withholding information. She can’t tell if she’s getting the full story. He offers to send another writer for help. Olivia immediately shoots it down, saying she has it under control. She hangs up with a frustrated sigh. She goes to call Michael, when the phone rings. It’s the front desk with a call from a man in the lobby. It’s Capa inviting her to a party with Hemingway. Olivia lights up and rushes to get ready, completely forgetting to call Michael.

Soon after, they’re in a lush hotel suite, with about a dozen other attendees and Hemingway at the center of the party. Olivia is enamored but nervous to be there. She pushes herself to ask other guests about Capa. We quickly learn Capa and Hemingway’s relationship is more of a rivalry; the two exchanging quips and barbs. Capa jokes that Hemingway’s beard scares all the women away, and Hemingway jokes back that this is the only time he’s seen Capa with the same woman twice in one day. Olivia steps up for herself, clarifying that she’s a journalist, writing a profile on Capa. Hemingway lights up, the chance to tell some dirt on his old war buddy. “Did he tell you about the time he almost got me killed with that damn camera?” Capa and Hemingway start to argue, telling the same story, but changing key elements back and forth – Capa was standing on a Jeep, no he was hiding behind a rock – Olivia jots notes, unsure who to believe. A guest interrupts, saying that the two just love war, violence, and macabre stories. Capa counters the assertion, saying he hates war and violence. “A war photographer’s most fervent wish is for unemployment.” The man backs down, and Capa takes control of the party. Olivia watches on, intrigued and admiring.

The next morning, Olivia awakens to a call from the hotel front desk, she’s to pack her things – her room has been terminated. Alarmed, she rushes down to the front desk to find out what’s going on, and is greeted by a bellhop from the Hotel Lancaster with a note. Capa is paying to get her a room at the Lancaster, to help ease her interview process. He signs off with his room number. She appreciates her new luxurious room, but can’t get over the idea that Capa is trying to get something in return – preferential coverage in her article? Visiting Capa’s room, Olivia passes a woman on her way out – evidently a guest of Capa’s last night. Inside, Olivia sees a much darker version of Capa, muttering and grim, not the charismatic charmer from the day before. He tells her about his favorite hangover cure, pure bottled oxygen – he learned that covering paratroopers in Africa. Capa shakes his face and practices smiles in the mirror. After his ritual, he’s ready to see the world.

At the Magnum offices, Chim jokes that he’s surprised that Olivia hasn’t been scared off, saying her grit reminds him of ‘La Pequeña Rubia’ – a reference that she doesn’t understand and Capa quickly sweeps under the rug, changing the subject to lunch. Chim can’t go along, he’s meeting with Ingrid. Capa grows sullen, but tries to hide it; Olivia catches this, and jots a note down in her notebook. Capa and Olivia stroll through Paris, a fresh dynamic between the two. Olivia thanks him for the new room and Capa reminds her that sleeping in abandoned barns in the war will make anyone appreciate a good hotel. She remarks on his free-floating ways, hopping around the globe. Capa shows her his ragged, taped-together green passport, explaining it’s a Nansen passport for stateless refugees. “Officially, I have no home. All this jetting around, I’m just doing as I’m told.”

We’re taken to 1936 Paris, in André’s studio apartment. He’s packing a small suitcase and camera bag when his girlfriend Gerda notices he’s packed condoms. André assures her they’re to protect film canisters from water leaking in. He begs her to come to Spain with him and cover the civil war, pressing the importance of putting a face to the conflict in a way only photos can. She agrees to go with him.

Along their walk, Olivia realizes that Capa is distracted by something, constantly looking across the street, craning his neck. She then sees, across the street is a café; tucked away at a table is Chim with an attractive woman. Is that Ingrid? Has she been unintentionally spying on someone with Capa this whole time?

At a chic fashion shoot Capa is overseeing, Olivia sits in the corner, writing potential ledes and notes for her article. She starts with Capa’s bravery, but always ends with how somber he seems. After the shoot, Capa sneaks a look at Olivia’s notebook and is quickly upset. Seeing notes on women, the racetrack, drunken fights, even a fresh circled one that says ‘Who’s Ingrid? -- Running from his past?’ Capa confronts her, saying she’s supposed to be writing about Normandy. Olivia defends herself, saying they’re just notes, not the story. Capa stomps off into the city, Olivia chasing after him. They argue about which one of them is being truthful and Olivia possibly overstepping her bounds. Capa gets fed up with her prying and spits out who Ingrid is: movie star Ingrid Bergman. They move through the city, passing Communist protests, open-air markets, and cultural landmarks. Capa starts to soften. He tells of their whirlwind romance as we see glimpses of their tender moments and happier times. She was going to leave her husband for him, but Capa wouldn’t settle down – What if he had to ship off to cover another war? – a recurring element in Capa’s relationships.

Capa and Olivia finally land at a cocktail lounge. Capa feels better, reminiscing about something other than war, even reflecting on how a street-kid from Hungary could be with the world’s biggest star. But Olivia sees shades of Capa from the morning, the sullen, world-weary man without a home. Capa is sent a drink from a fan at the end of the bar, and just like that he turns on the charm and transforms back into his magnetic self. Olivia takes a thoughtful note in her notepad.

Back in her hotel room, Olivia finally gets a chance to call Michael. She starts to excitedly gush about all she’s seen, the grandeur of Paris, the opulence, meeting Hemingway – but Michael cuts her off, upset. “You never returned my call. When I tried to call this morning, I’m told you checked out? Now you’re in some fancy hotel so you can be closer to Capa? How am I supposed to take this?” Olivia stands up for herself ­– Capa was being secretive, unreliable; the best way to get a full picture is to spend more time with him. She’s hurt that Michael’s would imply anything untoward. He begrudgingly apologizes.

On her last day in Paris, Olivia is in a melancholy mood. She knocks on Capa’s door, but he sends her away – he’s in the bath. She walks the streets of Paris on her own, trying to enjoy her time in the wondrous city. She happens past a community Easter parade down twisting cobbled streets, but the liveliness doesn’t lift her spirits. Back in Capa’s hotel room, he dwells on an incident from his war days: a soldier is having a panic attack in the trenches. Capa talks him down, distracting him with a conversation about philosophy. The man calms down and starts back on his patrol, but he’s shot just steps away by a sniper. Was Capa to blame? Just one of many instances that haunt Capa. He sinks into the bath.

At a send-off party for Capa, he’s mid-way through a story of accidentally stumbling into a minefield in Northern Africa when another photographer interjects, “Last time you told that story, it was Italy.” Capa laughs it off. To the side, Olivia marvels to Chim at how effortlessly Capa seems to float from one fawning woman, to a group of business investors, to a raucous boys-club of fellow photographers, and finally chumming it up with the wait staff, seemingly over all of it. Chim asks about her article and she admits it’s a puzzle; even after following Capa for days, hearing stories and watching his interactions, she still has no idea what to write. It still feels like a piece is missing. Chim quips that even knowing Capa for decades, he can’t be sure who he is sometimes. Olivia says that in a way she envies him. He’s a man who reinvented himself into exactly what he wanted to be, and he knows how to use it to get just what he wants.

That night, Olivia heads back to her room at the Lancaster, but when she passes the hotel bar something stops her. Listening to Capa’s romantic and daring stories for days, seeing the man who reinvented himself in action, she has to try it out for herself. She strikes up a conversation with a young man at the bar, speaking in an American accent with a new attitude and gravitas about her, introducing herself as ‘Linda.’ She’s an art dealer travelling through Europe. The two hit it off and she takes charge, asking him for his room number. Just then, Capa interrupts, spoiling Olivia’s experiment, upending the act.

Capa and Olivia talk into the night. Olivia explains she wanted to be exciting, to be wanted. Like Capa. Looking over the city, he lets the mask slip, the missing piece to his persona. They sneak into Père Lachaise cemetery, to the small gravestone of his old fiancé, Gerda Taro. She helped mold the Capa legacy, until her life was tragically cut short when she was killed covering the Spanish Civil War. Capa blamed himself, and with no life to return to, he stepped into the Robert Capa persona, taking on increasingly dangerous missions, leading to D-Day. His story recasts all the past events we’ve heard. His daring acts were a way to escape his pain – more nihilistic than adventurous. Olivia retells her past experience in the Blitz, how it was terrifying, crippling. She wishes she could just be brave and bold like him. Her truth inspires Capa to tell his truth. On the landing at D-Day, he was paralyzed with fear, frozen in his cover, barely able to force himself to shoot photos. We see D-Day as we did at the start, but this time it’s less heroic. More raw. He’s afraid. Before Olivia leaves Paris, Capa muses on his next assignment in Vietnam. Maybe he can cover war differently this time. He gives Olivia a camera as a memento. His final words are to cherish those close to her and never take time for granted.

Olivia returns to London, having learned a lesson in the masks we show to the world, savoring the present, and accepting the past. She settles down and marries Michael while at the same time moving forward in her career. She’s gotten a promotion and desk assignment after her article about Capa was a success. It’s a surface-level piece of action-packed war stories – she can’t bring herself to tell the man’s secrets. We see Capa in Vietnam, embedded with soldiers, but instead of taking photos of the action, he focuses on the civilians touched by war. On a transport run, Capa jogs forward a bit to get a better angle on the troops with civilians in the background. He steps off the road a few paces, only to hear the ominous metal ‘clink’ of a landmine. It explodes. Olivia gets the news at work, in shock for a moment, and then the tears come. She clutches at his camera, displayed proudly on her desk. Finally, we fade to a cramped studio apartment with a sliver of a view of the Eiffel Tower. Capa finds himself younger, standing in the center of the apartment. There’s a rattle at the door. He turns. It’s Gerda. He’s finally gotten his missing piece.

• Completed at the Cannes Film Festival screenwriting residency, CannesFilms Unlimited, and developed under the supervision of the Festival de Cannes, Vivendi, and StudioCanal.

• FINALIST - MGM + Black List Feature Partnership

• FINALIST - Sundance Feature Development Lab

• SEMIFINALIST - Page Int’l Screenwriting Competition

• QUARTERFINALIST - The Script Lab

• THE BLACK LIST Recommended Script