FAR NORTH:Directed by Asif Kapadia. Starring Michelle Yeoh, Michelle Krusiec, Sean Bean, Per Egil Aske, Jan Olav Dahl, Espen Prestbakmo 15A cert, limited release, 89 min ****

FOLLOWING THE disappointment of his dire 2007 horror film The Return, Asif Kapadia, one of England's more interesting young directors, returns to the epic folk cinema that characterised his superb debut, The Warrior. Set among the vast landscapes of northern Scandinavia, Far North takes a tale by Sara Maitland, a distinguished British feminist, and turns it into something that is simultaneously magnificent and preposterous. Even if you don't care for this singular drama, you cannot deny that it grabs the attention.

The reliably charismatic Michelle Yeoh plays an Arctic nomad who, as she explains in an opening voice-over, has been cursed to bring misery to all those she encounters. With this inconvenience in mind, she takes her daughter to the tundra where they live a rugged, isolated existence. That equilibrium is shattered when, one typically chilly day, a wounded soldier (Sean Bean, would you believe?) staggers over the horizon. Defying their usual habits, the two women take the stranger in and tend to his wounds. Inevitably, jealousies begin to develop between mother and daughter. Featuring echoes of classic westerns such as The Beguiledand The Searchers, Far Northdances across the line between realism and fantasy. It's a difficult trick to pull off, but the film has such a convincing seriousness that most viewers will find themselves accepting the most absurd developments. Watching the deliciously brutal, fantastically dramatic denouement - which reminds us how feminist literature so often tends towards folk tales - is akin to being jabbed in the forehead with an icy harpoon. I mean that in a good way.