Kamil’s peaceful life with his three wives in the remote region of Turkestan is disrupted when the fourth wife arrives. Changes simultaneously rush at a family that seem far from a historical upheaval that destroys long-standing family traditions. The film merges various motifs and images. The motifs of a polygamous family caught in a civil war between White forces and enemies clash with horizontal and vertical images. The images of building interiors indicate where characters and history overlap with an outside scenery. The signs of violent events to come are foreshadowed against a static background. A rare film in the history of Central Asian films, it shows a civil war and the changes in women’s lives under patriarchy and war. (HONG Sang-woo)