Script to Screen

In 1962, a group of would-be professional boxers set sail from Tonga on the Tuaikaepau, to seek their fortune in New Zealand. But what begins as an adventure becomes a fight for survival when their vessel is wrecked on an isolated Pacific atoll – Minerva reef. Surviving in the remains of a half-submerged Japanese fishing trawler that was wrecked on the same reef two year earlier, and given up for dead, the men battle the odds and their demons in a bid to stay alive. Minerva (working title) is an extraordinary true story of human faith and endurance, and of survival against the odds. Quite coincidentally, pre-production for Minerva has begun just as another 1960s tale featuring Tongan castaways has captured huge interest around the world. Rutger Bregman’s 2020 book Humankind contains an account of the ‘Ata castaways – six Nukuʻalofa Tongan schoolboys who in 1965 were marooned on an island for more than a year. Since Bregman retold this “real-life Lord of the Flies” story (which actually demonstrates a far more positive side to human nature than the darkness and cynicism of William Golding’s classic novel), the ‘Ata story has been shared and retold by millions of readers around the globe. Though Minerva is of course telling a rather different story, we believe there has never been a better time to tell this story of bravery, resourcefulness and survival against the odds in a Pacific setting, on the large screen.