Slogans, a sly, gentle satire of the absurdities of unreconstructed communism, reaches into rarely examined territory: Iron Curtain-era Albania in the late 1970s under its postwar strongman Enver Hoxha.

The setting is a school in a remote town; the main protagonist a Tirana-trained teacher (Artur Gorishti) who is posted there and fetches up against the obstinate small-mindedness of the local apparatchiks.

Key in establishing the petty officials' ascendancy over the locals is the practice to which the title alludes. As a demonstration of political faith, the schoolchildren are forced to assemble rocks to form Party mantras - American Imperialism Is A Paper Tiger and the like - to be visible from far away.

Slogans' masterstroke, in dramatic terms, is to make this activity a contentious one too: those out of favour with the local Party chief are given far longer slogans to construct. Our hero is rapidly enmeshed in bickering and jockeying as the bureaucratic placemen attempt to exert control over the teachers, and vice versa, as all prepare for the arrival of a motorcade of eminent politicians.

Subplots are folded in with ease: the teacher has an affair with one of his colleagues, a schoolkid's slip of the tongue lands him in front of a political tribunal and, funniest of all, an even more remote schoolroom constructs an out-of-date message.

Slogans, in truth, is an example of the kind of film-making that isn't very fashionable these days, and stands comparison with east and middle-European cinema that spawned the Czech New Wave and its ilk.

• At the UGC tonight. Box office: 0131-623 8030