A stark adaptation of Aharon Appelfeld's 1982 novel that keeps the historical horrors offscreen, challenging audiences instead with its formal severity. With its simple, bare-boned narrative made arcane by Gitai's more intuitive poetic flourishes, this female-oriented, Ukraine-set survival tale makes grander emotional gestures as it goes along -- integrating the eponymous Tsili's grueling odyssey with that of her people at large. Escaping the savagery of the valley, Tsili finds refuge in nature. Tsili gathers all the forces of intuition and vitality to survive in this desperate universe.