Newport Beach Film Festival 2008

Mardik Martin may be one of movie-making’s most important screenwriters — and least well-known. Mardik: from Baghdad to Hollywood traces one of the most unlikely journeys in American film history — from growing up in Baghdad to moving to New York and attending NYU, where he befriended Martin Scorsese. That relationship would lead to some of the greatest films in American Cinema (Mean Streets, The Last Waltz, New York, New York and Raging Bull). At the peak of his success, Mardik succumbed to fame and fortune and the destructive lifestyles of Hollywood. In 1986, a new path as a teacher emerged, instructing countless students about life and the art of screenwriting. Ultimately, it is a modern-day fable about reaching for your dreams and finding redemption in the end.