Writer-director Tom Petch picked up film of the festival prize at last year's Raindance bash with this gritty and downbeat account of British soldiers serving soul-destroying time in Afghanistan. Drawing on his own experiences of life in the army, Petch paints a convincing picture of demoralised troops; bitching about the shabby state of their weaponry, losing faith in the judgments of their superiors, generally disenchanted with risking life and limb in a war that is not their own.

Cinematographer Stuart Bentley shoots the Moroccan locations with enough grit to sand over the sometimes uncertain performances, and the wearing tedium of conflict is effectively evoked, broken occasionally by bursts of violence that are rightly harrowing.