Chronicle Of A Disappearance

A movie that opens with a long, nearly static shot so abstract the image is indecipherable isn't going to be to everyone's taste. In particular, it won't appeal to those with little patience for non-narrative, essayistic films: First-time feature director Elia Suleiman demands insolently that you wait with him for something to happen, and very little does. Though the apparently unrelated vignettes (many of which feature Suleiman playing a character suggestively called E.S.) suggest a documentary approach, their tightly controlled nature gives away the presence of a calculating filmmaker. It gradually becomes clear that this cinematic meditation is deeply rooted in ...