Abbas Kiarostami is a titan of narrative filmmaking. Recently, though, he's offered a series of challenging experimental works that eschew conventional narrative forms. Shirin is firmly in this trend. Kiarostami splits sound from image, presenting the audience with another 'audience', who watch another 'film' that remains off screen. It's a formally daring investigation of empathy in cinema. The entire picture consists of medium close-ups of women, as they watch a film in a cinema. We hear this 'film', but never see it; Kiarostami shows us only the faces of those watching. This 'audience' is played by an all-star cast of Iranian actresses – plus, in an oddly compelling twist, Juliette Binoche. The film they're watching is based on Nezami Ganjavi's The Story of Khosrow & Shirin, the great 12th century Persian epic about a romance between a Sassanian prince (Khosrow) and an Armenian princess (Shirin). This off-screen 'film' – which is in fact a fictional construct, conceived and produced after primary shooting – is a melodramatic piece of orchestrally scored conventional storytelling: the antithesis of a Kiarostami picture, even in his 'narrative' phase. It's almost possible to follow this unseen melodrama, but it's hardly the point. Shirin captivates through the powerful empathy that develops with the unnamed, unspeaking characters on screen. Fragmentary expressions, tiny gestures, a stray tear on an otherwise impassive face: each shot conveys veiled emotion, creeping out at the edges. We ourselves are sheltered from the emotional impact of the Shirin romance because we can't see it, but since we hear its highly emotive soundtrack, we know how the on screen audience 'ought' to feel at any moment. Therefore, as we watch these women who are absorbed, trance-like, in a narrative to which we have only partial access – and as we reflect upon our own response to their emotions, from our similar position as an audience – what develops is a remarkable sense of intimacy through shared experience. Watching Shirin is like watching people sleep: what the characters show on their faces is uniquely private. By letting us hear their dreams, though, Kiarostami induces a rare degree of empathy. This is unique, powerful work by a great filmmaker who is still breaking new ground.