The Stateless Diplomat: Historical Docudrama about Diana Apcar

Mimi Malayan's film The Stateless Diplomat raises awareness for a prominent historical figure, who played a crucial role in the history of modern Armenia. The film carefully follows the life of an Armenian woman living in Japan: Diana Apcar. The Stateless Diplomat is a film about perseverance, strength, devotion, and heroism. It is about a woman who not only survived in a male-dominated world, but who succeeded at running a business, writing books, raising three children, and fulfilling her dreams of helping the Armenian people.

Diana Agabeg Apcar was an Armenian writer living in Japan, where she moved with her husband, Michael Apcar, and newborn daughter, in 1890. Japan was then a place of hope and opportunity for young businessmen, like her husband. Unfortunately, her husband experienced several bankruptcies. During one of these bankruptcies, Diana Apcar was giving birth to their son, while creditors were removing her belongings from her house. The only thing she hid from them was her jewelry, which she gave to her neighbor. Her husband then died during one of his business trips, leaving Diana Apcar a young widow, with three small children in a foreign country.

Diana Apcar took over her husband's business, paying off his debts, and putting the trading company back on its feet. She was also very observant towards Armenian people in the Ottoman Empire, horrified by the atrocities committed against Armenians during WWI by the Turks. She foresaw that these massacres — 1895-1896 and 1909 — were all leading up to the mass destruction of an entire people, under the cover of World War I. These massacres gained significant coverage, but none of the European powers, who were actively involved in the Ottoman affairs, did anything to ensure the safety of Armenians, an opressed, Christian minority in Turkey. Diana Apcar wrote books, articles, and appeals to peace societies, academics, missionaries, and politicians, all in hopes of turning their attention towards the hostility of the Ottoman Empire towards its remaining minorities (as it was weakened by several of its countries all gradually regaining independence). Diana Apcar shouted the open secret that the Armenian massacres of 1895-96 and 1909 were all leading to a larger genocide. Mimi Malayan — Diana Apcar's great-granddaughter — included letters and other primary sources, proving Diana Apcar's devotion to her people and extreme desire to make a stop to the violence she witnessed happening. She believed in world peace, and often turned to G-d for hope when she felt that her work and efforts were changing nothing and helping no one. Her children recalled that she was a very spiritual woman, whose desire to help the world was genuine.

"A hundred years before the emergence of social media, Diana creates an extensive network of connections, arguing over and over that if nothing were done to protect the Armenians, new massacres would be an inevitable outcome" (dianaapcar.org).

Nobody paid attention to Apcar's efforts, and 1.5 million people were brutally slaughtered in the Armenian Genocide of 1915. Under the guise of WWI, Turks were able to commit such an enormous atrocity with the justification of war, without having to face any penalty. Malayan's film presented accounts of survivors', who either passed down their stories through written works or through oral tradition, in which case their children told what their parents had told them when they were young.

Malayan employed all sorts of artistic techniques to tell these people's stories, most of which was the visual artwork used to illustrate the entire film. This included the survivors' accounts, which were narrated and animated. These illustrations were black and white for most of the film, except for the segment where Diana Apcar discovered that the Armenian Genocide had begun. This segment was colored blood red, creating an extremely powerful contrast to the rest of the film.

When refugees started escaping their homes in Turkey in search of new ones, Diana Apcar shifted all her energy and resources into helping survivors of the Armenian Genocide, negotiating with the Japanese government, as a result of which Japan provided shelter for these people. She used her own resources to rent out houses around her own house to shelter refugees. She also enrolled Armenian children in schools, helped with documents and visas, and secured ship passage. During WWI, most passenger ships were either already overbooked or repurposed for the war, but Diana used her well-established connections to help the refugees find a way to travel onward.

Malayan's film had riveting audio to aid the visual representations, as well as a massive amount of expert interviews with people either directly related to Diana Apcar, or those who are expert historians. As a result, the overall impression from the film was informative and emotionally charged. It was filled with facts, presented in a very creative and emotive way. I found myself on the edge of my seat the entire time, even though I knew what the film was about before I came to the theatre.

The topic of discussion being very important, I think everyone should watch this film about Diana Apcar, a woman who was a feminist without that even being her intension. She didn't think of the fame this would bring her, because she cared about helping people more than about receiving credit for it. As a result of her hard work, the Japanese government appointed Diana Apcar the first Armenian woman diplomat in Japan; she was also possibly the first diplomat woman in the whole world!

Malayan's film is a must-watch. HERE'S THE TRAILER and thanks for reading!