IN THE SPOTLIGHT A contestant performs.

It’s one thing for Midwesterners to croon competitively on American Idol, and a whole different ball game when people for whom music has been forbidden and democracy is a pipe dream get to capture hearts by carrying a tune. At its best, Marking’s doc on four contestants gunning for the top prize on Afghanistan’s Afghan Star talent competition explicitly underlines how the show represents something beyond entertainment. Warring ethnicities are harmonious, in every sense of the word; a contestant who dares to dance during a number—a huge social taboo—soon receives death threats. It’s the Spellbound -lite aspects of the movie that, oddly, puncture the proceedings. Though the who-will-win? structure both allows a too-brief peek into the quartet’s backgrounds and generates tension, the answer almost seems superfluous. The phenomenon itself is the real star.

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