Loen (47) was once the righthand muscle of legendary Albanian mafia boss, Murat Dreshaj.  Once a legend, respected, feared, with the Bronx and NYC at his feet, a man who took six bullets and survived with the scars to prove it, a man now—after 18 years in the joint—today, a legend only in his own mind. Living in his mother’s basement, a rabid dog harboring untold grievances, desperate for the life and dreams he knew were his, now all pinned on Lisa, the new girl at his local spot. But all comes crashing down the night he bumps into the man who ratted him out all those years ago, a former colleague, turned informant. The film traces our flawed protagonist as he spirals out of control, grappling with what it means to be a man in his culture, where the code states “a head for a head, or blood for blood,” where a man is only as good as his word, his willingness to redeem his honor, or he should go home and “wash his dirty face”.

A pardoned ex-con reluctantly returns to prison as a visitor because an inmate keeps sending him postcards. “The hardest prison to escape is a hateful heart.”