The impulse that leads tourists to the remains of medieval abbeys or the abandoned cliff dwellings of the Anasazi fuels this wordless art film by Austrian director Nikolaus Geyrhalter (Our Daily Bread). Like some postmodern heir to the 19th-century Romantics (who nurtured emotional and aesthetic responses to bygone civilizations and viewed the natural world as a form of personal communion), Geyrhalter piques the imagination with images of decay: towns, malls, theaters, and hospitals, all deserted, unnamed, and overrun by foliage and wildlife. The opening shots of rippling water reflected on crumbling mosaics are mysteriously exotic; not until later, in wider shots, can one recognize murals of the former Soviet Union. Through another slow reveal, a Japanese ghost town turns out to be Fukushima. In this feature-length memento mori, humanity is evoked by its absence.
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