Croatia, 1991. Ivan and Jelena are in love and decide to leave their village to live together. But because she is Serbian and he is Croatian, their relationship is viewed with suspicion, because the war between the two ethnic groups is about to explode. In 2001 and 2011, while the war still has an effect on the lives and desires of both sides, two other love stories take place in the same Balkan region.

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Addressing war from the angle of a Romeo and Juliet love story is nothing new. But Croatian director Dalibor Matanic does so with a maturity, restraint and finesse that make The High Sun good, thanks also to the great idea of using the same actors (the excellent Tihana Lazovic and Goran Marković) play the lovers in each story, to which the audience clings like a buoy in a storm. It also helps that the war plays out in the background, making it a specter that hovers over every dialogue and silence over the decades. Behind its apparent simplicity, The High Sun is striking through its control and intelligence, and Dalibor Matanic is a filmmaker one should follow closely.