Cypriot comedy turns a coffee run into a community story

New film short made in the depths od the Cyprus community in London takes loyalty to the extremeFor most people, getting a coffee from somewhere other than your normal supplier is hardly a big deal. But in LOYAL, a simple change of café becomes a very serious matter. The nine-minute comedy by Cypriot filmmaker Antonis Papamichael and Malaysian director Sara Chia Jewell follows Arlo, a woman who visits the same local café every morning. She knows the barista, Eleni, sticks to her usual routine and is working her way towards her loyalty card’s free coffee. Then one morning, everything changes. The café is busy, Arlo is late for work and she decides to get her coffee somewhere else. There is only one problem. Eleni sees her. What follows is an awkward and increasingly ridiculous chain of events that turns an ordinary coffee run into a story about loyalty, community and the relationships we build in familiar places. For Papamichael, the idea for the film came from something very ordinary. “We wanted to make a wholesome comedy and was inspired by just visiting a café in the area we filmed in,” he said. The café became the natural centre of the story. It is the sort of place most people recognise, somewhere you might stop on the way to work, meet a friend or simply see the same faces every day. “A café is a part of most people’s routines,” Papamichael said. That familiarity is what makes Arlo’s decision so funny. She has not done anything terrible, but the film treats her decision to try another café as if she has committed a serious betrayal. The directors wanted to play with that idea and build a comedy around the small loyalties of everyday life. LOYAL brings the life of the Cypriot diaspora to screen For Papamichael, from Cyprus, the café also offered a way to explore the Cypriot community in London. The film was shot in north London, an area with a strong Cypriot presence. In LOYAL, the café becomes a place where people from the diaspora and the wider local community can come together. “For the people of north London, it’s very clear that it’s a home away from home,” Papamichael said. The details matter. Cypriot food and products appear in the café, including tiropittas, halloumi and pastries that many people will recognise. Papamichael said it was special to walk into a building that looked typically British from the outside and then find familiar Cypriot products inside. “It was truly awesome to speak Cypriot and hear my mother tongue in a short film I made,” he said. The shooting of LOYAL involved the English Cypriot community The sense of community was also present during the production. LOYAL was commissioned by North London filmmaking initiative Talkies Community Cinema and was crowdfunded with support from local businesses. For Papamichael, having local businesses and members of the community involved made the experience particularly meaningful. “It felt like we got closer to the Cypriot community in London, seeing us come together for a common goal,” he said. That experience also gave him the chance to see familiar traditions and products through a slightly different lens. After Eleni catches Arlo with her new coffee, Arlo heads to work at a dry cleaner. Her boss, Bilal, startles her and she accidentally spills the coffee over a pile of clean white shirts. Just when things could hardly get more awkward, Eleni appears. She jumps in to protect the shirts and ends up taking the coffee herself. Then, in one of the film’s more heartfelt moments, she produces a perfect latte for Arlo. After all, today’s coffee was free. The filmmakers drew inspiration from several different styles, including art house films, romantic comedies and 1990s action films. The result is a film that begins naturally before gradually becoming much more exaggerated. Papamichael said audiences have particularly enjoyed the film’s sudden zooms, which help signal when the comedy takes over. “We are very happy with that as we really enjoyed finding the right pace and length to communicate that really awkward moment between Arlo and Eleni,” he said. LOYAL has already travelled through a number of film festivals, including PÖFF, Brighton Rocks, the Hong Kong Film Festival UK, Leicester Film Festival and Super Shorts Hackney. It won Best Super Short at the Absurd Film Festival and was runner up for Best Comedy at Brighton Rocks. The film is now available online through Omeleto, a platform known for showcasing short films to an international audience. “We love watching Omeleto’s channel ourselves, so it’s been an honour and joy to share LOYAL with their large international audience,” Papamichael said. Despite its international journey, the film remains rooted in something very local. It is about a café, a familiar face behind the counter and the slightly awkward feeling of breaking a routine. But beneath the jokes is a simple idea. Communities are often built through small moments. A familiar coffee order, a conversation in your own language, a pastry that reminds you of home or someone remembering how you take your coffee. Sometimes, it turns out, loyalty is about much more than getting the next coffee for free.