Summer in Golden Valley

Halycon-sounding title; damned existence. Sixteen year-old Fikret stands on the roof of an office block overseeing the valley in which Sarajevo stands, watching the aeroplanes pass quickly over.  At his father’s ‘dzhenasia’ (traditional Muslim funeral), a man refuses to offer  ‘halal’ on the grounds that Fikret’s father died owing him $48,000. Fikret’s sense of ‘honour’ demands that he must repay the sum, whatever the method, and he is soon involved with the kidnap for ransom of a ‘new rich’ businessman's daughter. Vuletic’s film is intended, presumably, to portray the atmosphere of crime and corruption still obtaining in the rebuilding city, especially how it effects and perverts the young, but the script contains one implausibility too many and, crucially,  he doesn’t retain enough moral distance to fully convince.