This picture interlinks three stories on three different time levels. It starts in the present; today's Georgia is shaken by riots. Three friends are muddling through. Soon we concentrate on one of them. He plays a leading role every time. First as a medieval prince, than as a local officer of the Communist NKWD under Stalin. Those three levels are constantly referred to; they add to each other in a flow. Iosseliani has the same cast acting on all those levels. Every new entrance of the same actors in each episode underlines the continuity of occurrences in the flow of time. Despotism and terror rule at any time, injustice and bloodshed return eternally. It is for Iosseliani's craftsmanship that, along with all that bitter realization, there comes fun.
