Review

Patricia Clarkson is usually so “on” that it’s a surprise to see her play a melancholy, passive woman—and play her with such airy, elegiac grace. In Ruba Nadda’s Cairo Time, she’s the wife of a U.N. official; she arrives in Egypt to find him stuck in a Gaza refugee camp under mysterious circumstances. Ogled and accosted by Egyptian men, she drifts closer to her husband’s colleague (forlorn Alexander Siddig). They don’t talk much, but they fall into an easy, intimate rhythm. Will they … ? Won’t they … ? Like most good travel movies, the physical movement is in turn with the movement of the soul. Think In the Mood for Love with hookahs instead of chopsticks. — David Edelstein

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• David Edelstein's Full Review (8/9/10)