I always have a fascination for films which are the debut of a director. Plus this film is a nice thriller which is watchable at least once. The film has nothing that special. The story is good but not something innovative. However it is different from what I was seeing recently. The two parts of the film looked to be a lot different and by the time you have finished the film, you will barely have a memory of the first part. This is the major flaw that I think was present for me. Otherwise the film does steal the show in the second part. The acting of the main lead looks dull at some times but then his innocent face manages to save his part. Well when you have a different story to see than acting hardly matters. The way they built up the tension was good and the role of the person organizing the event was the best for me. Even though the film does not offer anything new, it has a sense of refreshment may be owing to the innocent face of the lead actor.MESSAGE: "Destiny is supreme."VERDICT: "A recommended watch once."

Gela Babluani, who at just 26 years old already knows more about suspense than many filmmakers absorb in whole careers, creates a fear so profound, a nightmare so believable that its talons rip into your perception. 13 Tzameti is elegantly minimal, and remarkably hard-hitting, and its monochromatic look at a cast of captivating, case-hardened mugs make it unbearable not to watch, even when proceedings grow nigh on unbearable.Georges Babluani, indeed the director's brother, plays young Georgian immigrant worker Sébastien, who is living in France and working construction jobs to sustain his destitute family. Working on the home of a man named Godon, he learns that he's a frail morphine addict, and is under police surveillance. Godon's overdose turns all of Sebastien's toiling into a waste, so when he overhears the widow furtively discussing an enigmatic "job" meant for her husband, desperate Sébastien filches the instructions for obtaining the mysterious position. The instructions are a crafty manner of evading the police. Sebastien is about to wish he didn't follow those instructions.Establishing himself with a muted eye and a smart ear, Gela has fashioned a film in three acts and while his exposition is intriguing and location striking, it's the innermost act that is laden with taut pressure, an astounding set piece that will hold spellbound any moviegoer willing to give it a chance. The composure in the work of both Babluani brothers is uncannily subdued and ripe, already free of the urge to show off, and works no more than to congeal the terror. Dialogue is short and curt, personalities deferential to plot, character names of such irrelevance that most do not in fact have evident ones while others are distinguished by purpose or by numbers on clammy T-shirts, or by a broken nose, a cane-aided hobble, an unpleasant gastrointestinal issue or a bespectacled slightness. And one would be negligent not to note the exceptionally good suspense thriller score by The Troublemakers, piano, flute and cymbals flitting about a Middle Eastern theme.The film's minimalism and force are ministered to by the bracing black-and-white cinematography of Tariel Meliava, which gives the work a noir look suggestive of the 1940s but with a ferment that is utterly new millennium. Indeed, this beautiful testosterone nightmare is a film thick with distinctive male faces, skillfully composed in black and white close-ups, like Diane Arbus subjects. We do get momentary sensations of character from some of these supporting players, like Aurélien Recoing's brutal Jacky and Vania Vilers' untamed Mr. Schlondorff. Also vibrant are men who back them, like Sébastien's sponsor Alain, all cultured cravat and tweed jacket, and a frenzied, panting gambler who would've been a Peter Lorre character in noir's halcyon days. Less a character than a device, Pascal Bongard is indelible as a delirious master of ceremonies, and helps power the anxiety with his roared announcements.Unlike so many low-budget debuts, 13 Tzameti is filled with genuine behavior on screen. The performances are all active and dynamic rather than static, sensory and specific instead of general. It's made on a shoestring by a bare-knuckle beginner, and it's a smart, austere film noir where men either have little hope or so much money it has warped their souls, though that is no reading of the film. It's purely experiential, which is why it's so effective. It has no superficial moralizing, and that detachment, with the underpinning of restrained formality in enterprising technique, makes for a gripping film to say the least.

13 Tzameti is brilliant; the cinematography was exceptional and the characters were all well written and engaging. I cannot recommend this film enough.Those of you interested in checking it out should be sure to hit the special features for an absolutely hilarious little short film entitled Sunday's Game. It was a witty little gore-fest featuring a group of adorable little old ladies gossiping, sipping tea and playing an ultra bloody game of Russian Roulette! Brains and doilies never looked so good! If you're thirsting for something new and different and you're able to watch black and white films with subtitling than look no further than 13 Tzameti. I know many people out there don't do B&W nor are they fond of subtitles but I highly recommend giving this film a shot. I don't think you'll disappointed with this fantastic bit of French / Russian cinema.

This moody little French film has, at its core, a good commercial idea but for me, the manner in which it is told is all wrong. Shot in gloomy black-and-white (presumably to add to the bleakness of the tale rather than economic necessity because surely black-and-white film must be more expensive to process than colour these days) the film struggles to get the viewer on the side of the young protagonist and therefore struggles to develop the element of suspense it needs to be a success.A roofer working on a beach-side house, finds an envelope containing a train ticket and hotel room number lost by his employer, who has just overdosed on heroin. Learning that he won't get paid as a result, and having previously overheard the dead guy say he was waiting for the envelope because he would earn a lot of money from it, our young hero decides to find out where the train ticket will lead him. After following a convoluted set of instructions he discovers he has stumbled into a nightmarish situation from which there is only one possibility of escape.I won't go into too much detail about the tournament that our hero chances upon, but I'm pretty sure that was the single image in the writer's head when he started writing and that everything else developed around that central idea of thirteen men in a room. If I'm right, that might go some way to explaining why I felt so uninvolved with what was going on. Although it's a good half-hour (at least) before anything really happens, little attempt seems to have been made to allow us to get to know the (nominal) hero, and his reasons for pursuing a potentially perilous mission just don't ring true.Everything is very low-key and downbeat, a technique which really should heighten the tension and the horror of the situation, but which just leaves everything feeling flat. The young guy in the lead is fairly convincing and plays his part well, and there are some wonderfully weather-beaten faces on display throughout, but everything seems a little bit, well, pointless – with no message imparted and an unnecessarily depressing ending.