Chronicle of a Disappearance

Palestinian narrative cinema, the little that exists (where would funding come from?), has been heartfelt, urgent, but often crudely executed "Israelis, get out of our face" melodrama. What a difference is Elia Suleiman's Chronicle of a Disappearance, an arthouse movie so formally sophisticated that nonfilm people might get lost a bit in the labyrinth of experimental strategies.

Suleiman, a Palestinian from Nazareth, spent 12 years in New York, where, before returning to Nazareth for Chronicle of a Disappearance, he obviously studied world cinema. (Jean-Luc Godard and Jacques Tati seem obvious influences, Godard for the politically minded master shots, Tati for the dry, deadpan, terrific sight gags.)

The first section of the film, done in static long shots, is devoted to random observations of the everyday life of his mother, father, and aunt in their middle-class home. Suleiman also films in the streets: the comatose Arab Laurel and Hardy, who sell fake holy water actually sneaked from the tap in their Holy Land souvenir store; a Russian Orthodox priest who complains that the Sea of Galilee has turned to excrement from "Americans and Germans eating Chinese food."

In part two, Suleiman (who is on camera) goes into Jerusalem, where, as an almost invisible man (the plight of the Arab intellectual?), he peeks in on PLO-type terrorists preparing bombs and stands by passively as Israeli police charge through his apartment with machine guns. It seems clear that Suleiman is for peace in the Mideast, though he's also disturbed by Israeli cultural imperialism. The final shots are of his Palestinian family at home in Nazareth watching as TV signs off with the playing of "Hatiqva" and the waving of three Israeli flags. At the Museum of Fine Arts September 18 through 20 and 25 through 27.

-- Gerald Peary