During the late 1980s and early 1990s the Armenian minority in Nagorono-Karabakh attempted to break away from Azerbaijan, one of the former Soviet republics. Overnight these former neighbors became enemies, and simple village folk were suddenly made hostages in a complex power game. One of the Azerbaijani villages right on the border is home to the family of the peasant farmer Kerim, who has just been captured by the Armenians. The village council decides to take an Armenian in order to arrange a hostage exchange. They imprison the wounded man in the barn next to Kerim's house, where his wife and three children desperately await the husband's return. The captive from the other side of the border finds himself in exactly the same situation - he, too, has three children, he finds it hard to scrape a living together, he has never done anything to harm anyone and, like Kerim, he just wants to go back home. But life in Karabakh is far more complex now. Blood calls for blood.

The Hostage

Fourteen-year-old Rustam lives with his mother in a village; his father was killed by the Russian mafia. After his father's death, Rustam tries to provide for himself and his mother without resorting to illegal money-making schemes. But his dream is to join a music band. The title of the film refers to an Azerbaijani fairy tale about saving a princess from a house with 40 doors; no one has succeeded in opening the last door, and thus its secret remains hidden. The villagers have named their village the 40th door as well.