More than a stone's throw away from the intense psychodrama that made his first feature 13 Tzameti so unique, The Legacy, writer/director Géla Babluani's collaboration with his brother Temur, is an unassuming travelogue whose leisurely pacing belies an acid wit toward global politics. Running a scant 76 minutes, the film feels full even though it skates around much in-depth development of its characters or even its central conflict, a testament to the skill of the Babluani tandem behind the piece.
Nikolai (Pascal Bongard), a guide-cum-interpreter for tourists in a small Georgian town, agrees to shepherd three French travelers -- Patricia, Jean, and Celine -- to a dilapidated castle Patricia (Sylvie Testud) recently inherited. After a run-in with local thugs who attempt to lift their pricey video camera, the group begins their travels via bus. Along the way they meet a vagabond (who pretends to be mute) selling canned goods, and a young man and his grandfather toting an empty coffin. Turns out the coffin is for the grandfather, who plans to sacrifice himself to end a long-running feud between rival families and have his grandson transport him home for burial. Sidetracking in an attempt to document the event and eventually hoping they can broker a more peaceful settlement for the warring clans, the tourists witness a chilling twist of fate and wind up leaving Nikolai to deal with the ramifications of their meddling.
The Legacy circumvents audience expectations from the get-go, beginning with an elliptical introduction of Nikolai before getting down to business. What business there is is handled in a distant, almost observational fashion, as we are only briefly introduced to characters and situations before moving on to another narrative building block until well into the film. The feuding families are given little room to explain themselves or their ridiculously epic conflict, and the tourists don't offer any real plan for resolving said conflict beyond expecting their assumed moral superiority to win out.
With so much left to the wind the picture still works splendidly, developing strong atmosphere for life in both urban and rural Georgia and offering the tourists' naïve hopes for peace on their terms as food for thought in a rapidly shrinking global society. Though there are dark elements to the film, its tone stays light due to most everything that happens being filtered through the chronically relaxed Nikolai for the sake of his foreign charges. Similar to a degree in look and feel to 13 Tzameti, The Legacy uses a simple aesthetic to underline its modest world.
A larger audience surely exists for the simple pleasures of The Legacy, and with Babluani's international clout rising one hopes it continues to be discovered and enjoyed. Knowing the director is slated next to re-conceive 13 for Hollywood, The Legacy is an exceptionally fresh bit of air; having seen him deliver two very different films which both clearly bear his signature, hope springs for his ability to twist his sensibilities in another new direction, even when revisiting old material
