Did I like Cyprus? I made a movie about it!
Sarah Oliver joins Martin Kemp to make a hit holiday film
IT’S hard to choose the kind of holiday mini-movie in which I’d like to star. A thriller perhaps, or a rom-com with my husband. Maybe a girls’ road trip like Thelma and Louise. This is why I am in Cyprus with Martin Kemp, star of Spandau Ballet and EastEnders, reality show judge, TV host, stage actor and film director.
He’s here in his capacity as ambassador for First Choice’s All In campaign to help families get the most out of their holiday footage.
We’re staying in Paphos, hometown of Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love. As well as world-famous mosaics and a cobbled hilltop old quarter, Paphos has a busy arts and museum scene and a harbour-side of banging bars and twinkly souvenir shops.
It would make a nice enough backdrop to a masterclass led by Martin but a Jeep safari and a dip in a postcard perfect blue lagoon promise something even prettier.
Together with my son Rufus, 11, we head out of town and on to the Akamas peninsula. A scout about for a great location takes us down to the biscuity sands of Lara Beach where, in June and July, green and loggerhead turtles come to lay their eggs.
With Martin’s instructions about
angles, action and audio echoing in my ears, I film Rufus more thoughtfully than is my habit. I also try my hand at some Attenborough-worthy images of Akamas’s gnarly juniper bushes and elegant cypresses, and songbirds catching the breeze above the pomegranate, fig and carob trees. At lunchtime Rufus takes a turn behind the camera. He perfects a time-lapse picture of our taverna table which comes out looking like a Greek feast painted by an Old Master, all sizzled haloumi, ripe, red tomatoes and viridian olives.
Afterwards, seeking a change of scene, we take an afternoon boat trip from the fishing village of Latchi to the Blue Lagoon, one of Cyprus’s most popular tourist spots.
I jump overboard to grab some underwater shots and immediately realise I am going to suffer for my art: the sea is bracingly cold.
By sunset I feel as if I have enough material for a feature film. Maybe even one with a sequel!
We retire to the Holiday Village Aliathon, a massive modern complex 200 yards from the beach in Paphos. It has pools, bars and restaurants and here are on-site activities to suit toddlers, teenagers and parents.
When Rufus and I say farewell and thank you to Martin over dinner he tells us how he spent the money from his first record deal on an analogue Super 8 motion picture camera back in 1979 and hasn’t stopped filming since. Last year he took a Go-Pro action camera on Spandau Ballet’s world tour and caught lead singer Tony Hadley singing Nessun Dorma in front of a mirror wearing only a towel…And that, as they say, is a wrap!