Review of The Time That Remains (2009) by Walter M — 09 Jan 2011

"The Time That Remains" starts with Menashe(Menashe Noy) picking up a passenger in his cab from the airport in Tel Aviv. Soon, an intense storm strands them, leaving the cab driver in a place that he does not recognize which is to be expected in a country where so many of the old towns simply do not exist anymore. It also might be because the story soon moves to July 16, 1948 with the surrender of Nazareth to the Israeli army that kicks in a fight or flight response for many.(And then there are those who choose neither by killing themselves.) For Fuad Suleiman(Saleh Bakri), it is definitely fight while finding a way to help a wounded man before being detained by authorities.

Elia Suleiman's previous film "Divine Intervention" was an angry and funny segmented look at the current state of the West Bank. With his latest, "The Time That Remains," the anger has mostly given way to sadness and resignation in an autobiographical film that takes place in 1948, 1970, 1980 and the present day and uses repetition as a way of denoting the dreariness of the everyday lives of the residents. Elia Suleiman is a character throughout and in the present day, the director plays himself, in silent witness of everything that unfolds before him. What's back is the impressive sense of the absurd which he nails(there's an even better tank gag this time around) by just letting the camera stay in one place.