Sergey Dvortsevoy’s Tulpan is billed as a love story, but it’s far from a typical onscreen romance. The Tulpan of the movie’s title is a young woman whose love is pursued by Dvortsevoy’s protagonist, a young Khazak sailor named Asa, but the film’s focus is not their courtship, but Asa’s life as a would-be shepherd. Tulpan is more of a love letter to agricultural life on Kazakhstan’s steppes than a story of human passion.

Like any good rural tale, Tulpan offers us a window out onto nature, which is often as grotesque as it is beautiful. The physical details of Asa’s surroundings are the most remarkable parts of the film: Sandy dust devils stretch from sky to the desert floor, camels and sheep roam, bellow and (often graphically) give birth.

But despite its stark and hardscrabble setting, the film is full of light. Asa’s attempts to woo the elusive Tulpan and impress her parents are more awkward and humourous than amourous. Dvortsevoy gives us dozens of other little comic moments, courtesy of supporting characters like Boni, Asa’s porn-obsessed best friend, and Asa’s family, whose squabbles and quirks feel familiar despite the fact that they are played out on the bare floor of a yurt.

Tulpan is worth a look for its gentle humour and its ethnographic interest, but thrill seekers beware: Dvortsevoy’s plot is as a bare as the Kazakh horizon.

Published in Volume 63, Number 30 of The Uniter (August 13, 2009)