Synopsis:
After escaping their war-torn city, a mother brings her 12-year-old twins to live with their estranged grandmother, a mysterious and ruthless woman known as YAGBABA. Her isolated, unusual house stands on the border of a nameless country, in a remote mountain village where time seems to have stopped. Confronted with an unfamiliar and harsh world, the twins instinctively decide to undergo a brutal, self-imposed survival training, forcing themselves to grow stronger for what lies ahead. YAGBABA rules her domain with an iron will. The villagers fear her, whispering about her inexplicable bond with the land and nature. Facing the same hardships herself, she teaches the twins that only those who abandon weakness can survive. Day by day, their innocence fades; they learn to hunt, to fight, to suppress fear, shame, and frailty. Yet the deeper they venture into her world, the clearer it becomes she is no ordinary old woman—strange things happen around her, defying logic and reason. As the war draws closer, it disrupts the fragile balance of the village. The arrival of European military observers, led by an officer and his aide, brings a different set of values from the outside world. Though they settle in YAGBABA’s home, in a place where myth and reality intertwine, their presence means little and only deepens the uncertainty. Torn between their primal survival instincts, YAGBABA’s enigmatic power, and the horrors of war, the twins must decide what life-changing choices to make. In a world where civilization and wilderness collide, their decision will shape their fate forever. YAGBABA is a story of harsh coming-of-age, adaptation, endurance, survival, and the thin line between reality and legend. Set in a post-war landscape, it explores the primal strength needed to endure in a world that leaves no room for the weak.