Shot in grainy black and white, made with a tight leash on the economic aspects, and eerily minimalist in composition, French filmmaker Gela Babluani’s debut feature 13 Tzameti is a sparse yet effective thriller. It is an austere tale of psychological terror, at the heart of which lies a subtle and intelligent variation of Russian roulette, where the players and members of an underground society participate in a deadly game of highest possible stakes. The director’s younger brother, in his (you guessed it) debut acting performance, has done a fine job in the role of the protagonist who realizes in the worst possible manner, as a critic so aptly put it, that “there’s no such thing as free lunch.” This low budget arthouse movie with a deceptively calm and mundane opening, allows a steady buildup of tension. Though neither greatly nerve-wracking nor filled with any remarkable character study, this ingenious low-budget movie nonetheless points towards a promising career for the director.
Director: Gela Babluani
Genre: Thriller/Psychological Thriller
Language: French
Country: France
