Chronicles of That Time review – oblique migrant doc casts eye over fortress Europe

This enigmatic film by two artists recounts 15 years of migration to Europe – but tells us too little about its human subjects

This brief experimental documentary about migration to Europe comes from the Italian artists Maria Iorio and Raphaël Cuomo and is a collage of unused footage from video pieces they have made together over the past 15 years. It’s a film with interesting things to say about the fortressing of Europe during that time, but I confess to finding it hard going and slightly frustrating. By the end I wondered if it might not have worked better as a gallery installation alongside the duo’s earlier works.

It opens in 2006, at night on Lampedusa, the tiny Sicilian island where thousands fleeing war and poverty in Africa and the Middle East arrive on dinghies and small boats every year. We’re in a car parked on a busy dock and a man, heard not seen, hums a song, trying to remember words in Arabic. This is Abdelhamid, who is Tunisian and employed as a seasonal worker at a hotel on the island. He’s also an interpreter for the film-makers.