Ten Minutes Older – The Trumpet

Despite an inevitable unevenness (with Chen's final 'comedy' the standout disappointment), this portmanteau of ten-minute shorts loosely linked by the theme of time has a higher strike rate than most such compilations. Lee and Herzog's documentaries (on the Bush election fiasco and an Amazonian Indian tribe, respectively) are slight but illuminating, the Wenders a silly thriller improved by its landscape photography, and the Kaurismäki an engagingly droll romantic fable. Better, Jarmusch has fun exploring the notion of 'dead time' in a wry, elegant tale of an actress's trailer-break, while Erice steals the show with a beautiful monochrome vignette poetically juxtaposing Spain in 1940 with a newborn child in mortal danger. Quite masterly, it only makes you wish he worked more frequently.