★★★☆☆
The Nepalese civil war of 1996 to 2006 forms the backdrop to The Black Hen, a tough-love drama with shades of Bicycle Thieves about two boys from either side of the caste divide who are searching for the titular fowl. The hen, Karishma, used to belong to the low-born Prakash (Khadka Raj Nepali) and had the potential, through egg sales alone, to lift him and his older sister out of poverty.
Instead, it was casually sold by his father and its retrieval has somehow become, even with war raging in the background, a matter of life or death. Gorgeously shot, with Himalayan beauty in nearly every frame, the slow pacing and shouty pre-pubescent acting might test even the most patient of audiences.
12A, 90min