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Shortly after September 11, the New Yorker lifted the gloom a little with a funny cover depicting a mock map of Central Asia transposed over New York City with countries bearing names like "Taxistan," "Khantstandit," and "Stan." Two and half years later, we still don’t know anything about the place. That’s one reason to drop in on the Museum of Fine Arts’ "Films from Along the Silk Road: Central Asian Cinema." As seen in the series’ opener, the elliptical and poignant black comedy Angel on the Right by Tajikstan’s Jamshed Usmonov, these people share much in common with the rest of us: greed and corruption, of course, but also motherhood and movies. The former lures Hamro (Maruf Pulodzoda), a battered thug fresh out of a Russian prison, from his digs in Moscow to his Tajik home town of Asht, where he owes lots of dangerous people money. His mom, Halima (Uktamoi Miyasarova), claims to be dying and wants him to come back to restore her house so she can do so with dignity, but in fact it’s a ruse devised by her and the mayor (Mardonkul Kulbobo) to make him face up to his debts, his illegitimate son, and his wasted life. Hamro responds by working at the local movie theater and using his job as an alibi when he robs the mayor’s safe. He gets much of his macho posturing from the Hollywood-inspired action movies he projects on the screen, but Usmonov’s humanity and authenticity is native born. In Tajik with English subtitles. (89 minutes)
BY PETER KEOUGH
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