An Estonian box maker, left behind in the Caucasus Mountains after most of his countrymen have fled the Georgian civil war, gets pulled into the conflict when he shelters a Georgian soldier and an Abkhazian rebel who are both badly wounded in a nearby skirmish. Stuck under the same roof, these two enemies hiss at each other as they convalesce, each hoping to recover first so he can kill the other man, while their taciturn host shames them both with his own courage and humanity. Writer-director Zaza Urushadze turns this fragile premise into a superior chamber drama (2013), the mutual antipathy between the two fighters gradually cooling even as the war outside their door constantly threatens to inflame it. I’ve seen this kind of story play out before, but never in someone’s living room. In Russian, Georgian, and Estonian with subtitles.
Tangerines
NR • 1 hour 23 min • 2013
