Hutton Marshall | Uptown Editor

For the final two and a half years of the 1960s, Nigeria was upheaved by a bloody civil war that took the lives of more than one million civilians and shattered already strained relationships among different ethnic groups in the country. It was the result of an ultimately unsuccessful attempt by the Igbo, a tribal, ethnic group in the region, to separate from Nigeria and form the Republic of Biafra.

Highlighted by the 2013 drama, “Half of a Yellow Sun,” the conflict violently demonstrated the arrogance of colonial-drawn boundaries in countries like Nigeria, where ethnic and tribal identities were often overlooked by the European powers.

While the film has a historical perspective in its illustration of this national tragedy, it tells the tale through an intimate, personal narrative. By focusing on a small, prosperous, but relatable Nigerian demographic, thus resonating with viewers far beyond the region’s borders.

Based on a novel of the same name written by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, the film opens with twin Igbo sisters Olanna and Kainene as they return from university in England to pursue careers in academia and business, respectively. Rich, pretty and intelligent, the twins have a bright future at the film’s opening. Along with Olanna’s live-in boyfriend and outspokenly political academic Odenigbo, their houseboy Ugwu and Kainene’s English lover Richard, the sisters quickly establish comfortable, affluent lives — but not without some drama and infidelity thrown in. Save the houseboy, they’re all politically opinionated, but, aside from ideological sympathies, they aren’t tied to the country’s growing unrest.

While war narratives centered around the well-off routinely ignore poor demographics that are often hit worst in conflict, Yellow Sun demonstrates that the impacts of such conflicts are absolute, as was especially the case in this bloody war, which went down in history for using starvation tactics most effectively. No one, no matter how cushy their lives were before the war, was exempt from having their lives crumble beneath their feet.

The fluid, intentionally chaotic and ultimately ambiguous plot is carried out by leads Chiwetel Ejiofor (12 Years a Slave, Children of Men) and Thandie Newton (Crash, The Pursuit of Happyness), both of whom flesh out angry and overwhelmed characters that realize the futility of their intellectual prowess in an inhumane conflict.

Straying away from the blunt force trauma of this review’s heavy subject matter, Yellow Sun was filmed entirely in Nigeria, weaving the country’s natural beauty into a tranquil backdrop in the happier portions of the movie. The music, too, is culturally authentic without being too alienating to western ears. While the film is far from uplifiting, it provides a well-crafted, poignant look at war off the battlefield, and encourages clinging a little more closely to the constants in our lives.

Half of a Yellow Sun plays at the Digital Gym in North Park from June 27 ­­- July 3. Visit digitalgym.org for tickets and showtimes.