lasherxl There are moments in the film of sheer visual brilliance and even a fantastic narrative, though I doubt anyone could ever deny Atom Egoyan is a visually haunting artist. Between the various ruins and moments of real time captured on the trip making the film you see a true landscape, not only of the area, but of its people and what makes them who and what they are.The problem is that with all that greatness are long moments of unneeded scenes or derivative exposition that remove the warm touching moments and at times just bore the ever loving crap out of you. Mind you I'm not anti art or art-esque films, it's just that these didn't really add a magical moment or create an air of mystery to the overall story or film.I feel like the best part of the film was the Armenian man's story. The added problem here is that you only ever hear his stories second hand via the female translator, and they lack the dramatic impact he has when telling them, only you can't understand his words because there are no subtitles.The 5 rating was mainly I just felt like everything good he captured he lost in being a tad pretentious.

ocarol7 It is clear to me that I appreciated this film much more than many who have written so I am moved for the first time to add my voice to this wonderful site-I found the juxtaposition of the photography trip in Armenia with the sequential interviewing back in Canada to be a structural choice that kept my interest, as was the ongoing opportunity to compare the nature of the detached, linear and increasingly controlling photographer (played by Egoyan himself) with the developing flow and connected communication going on between the translator who is blossoming (Arsinee Khanjian, Egoyan's real and cinematic wife) and the self assured yet relaxed driver (Ashot Adamyan). His later decision to foster a child remotely rather than enter into the messiness of actually raising one of his own with his wife also reflects aptly the polarity between his wife and himself.Viewing the Armenian sites as they are being photographed and then as photographs on the finished calendar as time passes was likewise a satisfying editing choice as far as I'm concerned.The slow pace of life in Armenia, with its evocative landscapes and holy sites as well as contact with the group of local men who appear to be sharing in music making just for the primal joy of it reveals some of what the translator is being touched by, all that is apparently escaping her husband even as he sees the effect it is obviously having on her.I found myself increasingly pulled into the film as it went on, which may say something about my own penchant for beautiful and remote places as opposed to the busyness and business of more ordinary Western life.

m_ats Questions of diasporic national identity are brilliantly addressed in the concept of a modern society, through various media, paralleled to more personal and private issues such as jealousy, stubbornness and personal pride. Only a person with very little life experience could not comprehend anything to what is going on in this movie. Atom Egoyan succeeded in making a very universal film that is touching at more than only one level. With this film, he proves that he is more than a good film director, but truly an artist who is able to transpose a world view through simple a medium, with low budget. This is personally my favorite Egoyan film, though it's by no means the longest or most commercially successful.

Stu-24 Atom Egoyan's work is almost always about a distance from the immmediate events occurring. This film is no exception to this rule, but is heartbreakingly more accute in its treatment of the theme. Unlike the more popular films, there is no sympathy for the supposed main character, played by Atom himself. He is a dispicable, soul-less chap, without hope or redemption, lost in a fate of repetition that is of his own creation. Moreso than Egoyan's other films, this repetition is a fantasy, moreso than compulsion. Here guilt is as much at play as destiny.This film hurts me.