Midday Manhattan. Asphalt and stone, men in suits, black sedans, shadows, and stark winter light that cantilevers between tall buildings. This is the setting for Martine Stig’s second film Play (2009), a ten-minute sequence shot in New York’s financial district. Like her earlier film Suto-ri- (2007), a dreamlike montage of passers-by in Tokyo, Play consists of candid shots taken in public space and composed to suggest a skeleton narrative. A man lingers on a sidewalk; a woman in heels stalks down a deserted street; a car with tinted windows draws alongside a work entrance; a call is made, hands gesticulate. The gestures caught by Stig’s camera evoke storylines of intrigue mapped over the conventions of film noir…-Joanna Fiduccia-