Chronicle Of A Disappearance

A brief synopsis:

The movie is non-narrative and structured like a video diary. It starts out in the Palestinian filmmaker's hometown of Nazareth then moves to Jerusalem before concluding back in Nazareth.

Prompts for this blog:

Analyze at least three specific scenes that you found particularly significant or revealing and why.

The scenes I found the most revealing were the scenes of family and the rather mundane scenes of goings-on about town.

The family scenes are just average family scenes: gossiping, talking trash about the neighbors, fishing with the guys.

The town scenes are also pretty routine: bored shopkeepers, guys hanging out, chain-smoking, breaking up fights outside a cafe.

Here and there, mixed in with the other ambient noise are snippets of news reports and other broadcasts.

Eerie.


In the last scene, the filmmaker's parents have fallen asleep in font of the television. As the broadcast day concludes, the Israeli national anthem plays behind an image of Israeli flags waving in a breeze.

Were there any aspects of those scenes or the film as a whole that you found confusing or unclear?

Actually, most of the film is unclear but the intention of the absurdist "political" segment - the Palestinian woman and the walkie-talkie...the fireworks...the mannequin...everyone piling into the car....all pretty confusing.

If you had to rewrite the ending, how would you change it?

Hmm....showing the filmmaker's parents asleep in front of the TV actually worked quite well. The entire section after the filmmaker returns to Nazareth from Jerusalem is much more subdued than the earlier Nazareth segments so it seems appropriate.