24 FRAMES, not rated, experimental drama, Center for Contemporary Arts,

The final film of Iranian director Abbas Kiarostami (1940-2016) is a remarkable evocation of nature and beauty. Merging his passion for photography and filmmaking, Kiarostami crafted a movie inspired by paintings and still images, made up of 24 chapters of roughly four and a half minutes each. There is no dialogue, but there is music on occasion, and the images — even the shots of actual paintings — are never completely still.

The first segment is a shot of Dutch painter Pieter Bruegel the Elder’s The Hunters in the Snow, in which two men lead a pack of dogs from a village toward a frozen lake. After a moment, elements of the painting become animated: a bird flies off, a light snow begins to fall. Winter scenes dominate in and while there is no story that extends from one vignette to the next, one can appreciate the lush romanticism that infuses each frame. The next scene is a shot of horses in the snow, shot from the vantage point of an automobile through a half-open window, the car’s stereo playing pleasant music. The viewer is tasked simply with appreciating the joy of two horses engaged in loving play.

is the antidote if you need an escape from the fire and fury, the tumult and intensity, of Hollywood blockbusters and their fast-paced editing. It’s unabashedly slow, but provides much for the viewer who is willing to simply look, and at less than five minutes, no one segment lasts long enough to cause discomfort. This isn’t Warhol’s after all. If you wait long enough for something remarkable to happen, something will. In one part, the snow falls gently on a stand of trees. There is stillness for a moment or two — and then the rush of an elk herd moving through the frozen landscape. Two lions at rest, glimpsed through a rock formation in the rain, face each other for a period of time until the male suddenly mounts the female and they begin to mate. From an interior, while “Ave Maria” plays in the background, the silhouette of a pigeon is seen in the half-raised shade of a window. The light outside grows dim, then stronger, and then dims again, perhaps because of the movement of clouds overhead. The viewer is made aware of the slow passage of time. Kiarostami was primarily inspired by his own photographs to create

Each part relies on the unexpected, the candid, and the spontaneous, as the director could not predict what the weather or wildlife he filmed would actually do, and what might enter into his shot.

The only people in the entire film are seen on a laptop that sits upon a desk in a scene lit by a table lamp’s soft glow. On the screen, we see two lovers in an old black-and-white film. It’s both the last scene of Kiarostami’s film, and the final scene of whatever movie is playing on the laptop. Somehow, this image — of lovers, embracing in the dark of night in a slow-motion kiss — seems fitting for a movie in which the human presence is often unseen and only felt, in the half-opened car window, and in the occasional use of incidental music. Lovers look at the world as Kiarostami does, with gratitude and appreciation for the fullness of every moment. — Michael Abatemarco