The Cut

This marks the first script for a feature film written by Mardik Martin in 34 years. His last known work was for Raging Bull (1980).

Martin Scorsese was quoted as saying: "Fatih Akin's The Cut (2014) is a genuine, hand-made epic, of the type that people just don't make anymore. In other words, a deeply personal response to a tragic historical episode, that has great intensity, beauty and sweeping grandeur. This picture is very precious to me, on many levels."

Director and screenwriter Fatih Akin is a German citizen of Turkish descent. Screenwriter Mardik Martin is an American citizen of Armenian descent. The Cut (2014) represents the first collaboration between an Armenian and a Turkish screenwriter on a feature film about the Armenian Genocide in film history.

Fatih Akin on informing the audience about the historic Armenian Genocide through The Cut (2014): "I believe in that. Certain people may not need it. But other people need another rhetoric to understand this, I don't want to be preachy or act as a teacher but I want to create empathy. I made the film so that the Turkish audience could identify with an Armenian hero, which isn't easy. To do this you have to keep it simple and not challenge the audience with too much intellectual attitudes, but challenge them emotionally."

The main character's name 'Nazaret Manoogian', played by Tahar Rahim, contains multiple references: The first name is obviously a reference to the Armenian people's Christian religion (Jesus of Nazareth). The surname can be interpreted as a reference to two prominent Armenian-Americans: a) Alex Manoogian (June 28, 1901 - July 10, 1996) was an Armenian refugee of genocide from the Ottoman Empire and immigrant to the United States, who later became an industrial engineer, businessman and entrepreneur in Detroit, Michigan. The billionaire Manoogian was a philanthropist who donated to churches, educational institutions and charities of the Armenian Diaspora, to preserve and continue their culture. In 1993, Alex Manoogian was named a 'National Hero of Armenia' and a citizen of Armenia by President Levan Ter Petrosian, the first person outside the country to be so honored. In 2007 Alex Manoogian and his wife Marie, who died in 1993, were buried with state honors in the Republic of Armenia. b) Haig Manoogian (May 23, 1916 - May 26, 1980) was an Armenian-American professor of film at New York University and a major influence on filmmakers like Martin Scorsese, who was one of his students. Manoogian co-produced Scorsese's first feature film Who's That Knocking at My Door (1967). His masterpiece Raging Bull (1980) is dedicated "with love and resolution" to his former teacher Manoogian. Since director Fatih Akin dedicated this film among others to Scorsese as his "master and godfather" this reference must be regarded as intentional.