True Noon

As in so many former Soviet republics, it is never really quiet in Tajikistan, wedged between Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and China. Nevertheless, there's always love, the weather report and the village school. Nosir Saidov's debut film illustrates this with a story filled with tragic facts and ethnic conflicts. A peaceful mountain village is split in two from one day to the next by a political decision imposed from above. As a result: barbed wire and landmines that separate one side from the other - the hospital is on the left, the post office is on the right, Nilufar lives on one side, her bridegroom on the other. The main ingredients needed for a 'comedy of errors', and although Saidov calls True Noon an absurd story, at the same time it is also absolutely true. Even though very few films have come from Tajikistan recently, True Noon proves that good cinema does get made there. Partly supported by the Hubert Bals Fund.