In a film that’s been compared with the work of Paradjanov for its colorful, mystical, and myth-based story, Khamraev fashions a fragmented, dreamlike coming-of-age tale. Medieval Uzbekistan is the setting for an odyssey that launches an orphaned boy into a harsh world, where first love is brutally trumped by aristocratic privilege, friendship is fragile and fleeting, and violent challenges lurk at every turn. Khamraev’s triumph is in creating a fairytale world of wonder that transforms the tawdriness of reality.