Calendar

CALENDAR filters Atom Egoyan's abiding obsessions into the most compact form he's yet achieved. After traveling home to Armenia to shoot a series of churches for a calendar commission, the film's photographer protagonist looks back on the trip to retrace the disintegration of his relationship with his then partner. Back in Canada a year later the glossy photos look down from the walls on his loneliness, while his ex's occasional telephone calls from Armenia go miserably unanswered. Egoyan's degree of narrative control and thematic focus makes for an hour-and-a-quarter of sustained viewing pleasure.