by Brian Whitener
review
In scene after scene, a lovely woman excuses herself on cue from the table and begins speaking on the phone in a foreign tongue. Her male companion begins to write, seemingly stimulated by the chatter. The repetition of erotic ritual plays a role in most every Atom Egoyan feature, but Calendar most thoroughly explores this wellspring. The source in this case is a calendar of photographs of Armenian churches, or, more precisely, the relationship between photographer and translator (Egoyan and Arsine Khanjian). Calendar is a tiny masterpiece with cinematography that does justice to the Armenian film which influenced Egoyan, the ravishing The Color of Pomegranates.
