Blackbird Blackbird Blackberry (Shashvi shashvi maq’vali)

There’s a feeling that this film could take a more surreal edge than it does when slipping partway down and ravine the climbing back up. Etero (Eka Chavleishvili) sees her corpse at the bottom of said ravine, surrounded by her friends.

Etero’s life in a small rural village in Georgia doesn’t amount to much more than looking after the shop, the weekly delivery and being on the end of quips from her friends about being single and childless. But she’s has ambitions and is happy.

Etero defends her status robustly to the point of almost severing their friendship. Though without telling anyone Etero has started a relationship with delivery man Murman (Temiko Chichinadze). It’s all very hush hush as he’s married.

That’s no real surprise though the village is conservative as the locals gossip as to whether a local woman was still a virgin on her wedding night. And the village runs on gossip the boredom of life for the women is coffee, cards, and cake. The men appear little more that sexist drunks.

Etero maintains her dignity in all this; she’s independent and can do what she wants. Things she greatly values yet when Marmun tells her he’s taking on a better paid job driving to Turkey, her world appears to fall apart. Suddenly she’s feeling an uncertainly she hadn’t before.

What also transpires as Etero’s complex character develops is a guilt that she has been made to bear for the early death of her mother, the root of this her late brother and father.

There’s dark depth to the narrative. It’s barbed with observations such the expectations of a patriarchal society of marriage and children, to a lesser extent servitude.

Marmun isn’t immune from this attitude. When he asks Etero to join him in Turkey he suggests she can take on a menial job. Its sharply rejected indicating that Marmun has learnt nothing about Etero during their time together.

Directed by Elene Naveriani, coscripted with Nikoloz Mdivani, from a book by Tamta Melashvili, the pace is slow at times glacial.

But its Chavleishvili’s nuanced performance that entices the viewer on. Holding her own she is refreshingly assertive with clear ambitions for her retirement and future. And yet wracked by feelings of unfulfillment and guilt.

Blackbird Blackbird Blackberry will be in UK cinemas from 3 May 2024