The film legends Volker Schlöndorff and Jean-Claude Carrière have made a number of award-winning films together, among others The Tin Drum. Ulzhan is closer to Schlöndorff’s Homo Faber and shows a Frenchman’s attempt to exorcise his own demons at the end of the world. Charles is a driven man with his sights squarely set on a goal that only he himself knows, and he now resolutely throws himself into an adventure. When his car breaks down in Kazakhstan, he simply continues on foot. On the way, he bumps into a bunch of colourful characters – among others a shopkeeper who sells words, and a beautiful young local girl, Ulzhan. In this existentialist road movie he proceeds through a mysterious landscape, where old nomad customs live in an environment of radioactive zones and abandoned prison camps. The gripping and magnificent images make the film a memorable and evocative journey.