It鈥檚 not unusual for a city to double for another metropolis in movies. New Yorkers have long been able to spot when Toronto has been substituted for the Big Apple. Matthew Rankin, though, has gone more than a step, or maybe 85 steps, further.
His 鈥淯niversal Language鈥� takes place in Winnipeg, Manitoba, but the culture is entirely Iranian. Farsi is the spoken tongue. At Tim Hortons, tea is served from samovars. It鈥檚 as if we鈥檝e been knocked over the head and woken up in some snowy, Canadian version of an Abbas Kiarostami film.
And in Rankin鈥檚 surreal and enchantingly discombobulating film, that鈥檚 more or less the case. No reason is ever stated for the strange, deadpan fusion of Winnipeg reality and Iranian New Wave cinema. But there鈥檚 that title. If cinema is a universal language, it鈥檚 never been more elastically employed, bridging worlds 6,000 miles apart for a singular kind of movie dream, like what Rankin might have spun in his head while drifting off to sleep on a Manitoba winter night while Kiarostami鈥檚 鈥淲here Is the Friend鈥檚 House?鈥� played on TV.
It鈥檚 both an extremely exact homage to the films of Kiarostami, and other Iranian masters, and a comic lament for how distant their movies might feel for a Winnipegian director. Rankin has joked that 鈥淯niversal Language鈥� brings together the rich poetry of Iranian filmmaking and a Canadian cinema that emerged 鈥渙ut of 50 years of discount furniture commercials.鈥�
The gags start immediately, with an opening title logo for 鈥淎 Presentation of the Winnipeg Institute for the Intellectual Development of Children and Young People鈥� 鈥� a twist on the Iranian institute that produced 鈥�70s classics, like Kiarostami鈥檚 Koker trilogy.
Like those films, Rankin鈥檚 is framed with kids. In the first scene, a displeased French teacher (Mani Soleymanlou) chastises his young students for speaking Persian. One child, an aspiring comedian. is dressed as Groucho Marx. Another says a turkey stole his glasses. Another wants to be a Winnipeg tour guide. The teacher asks them all to read from their book. In unison they read: 鈥淲e are lost forever in this world.鈥�
鈥淯niversal Language,鈥� scripted by Rankin, Ila Firouzabadi and Pirouz Nemati, lightly juggles a handful of characters we intermittently check in with. That includes an adult tour guide (Pirouz Nemati), whose attractions include the site of 鈥渢he Great Parallel Parking Incident of 1958.鈥� There are also two girls (Rojina Esmaeili and Saba Vahedyousefi) who find a banknote frozen in ice. A character named Matthew Rankin (played by Rankin) is traveling to Winnipeg by bus to visit his ailing mother after departing his bureaucratic job in Montreal. Oh, and there are turkeys. Lots and lots of turkeys.
Rankin鈥檚 film, his second following the also surreal 鈥淭wentieth Century鈥� (2019), is propelled less by narrative thrust than the abiding oddity of its basic construction, and the movie鈥檚 slavish devotion to seeing it through without a wink. As the movie moves along in formally composed shots, something wistful takes shape about the possibilities of connection and of insurmountable distances.
I鈥檝e twice now seen 鈥淯niversal Language,鈥� a prize-winner in Cannes鈥� Directors Fortnight last year that was shortlisted for the best international Oscar, and I still barely believe it exists. Rankin鈥檚 movie, in melding two worlds, risks taking place in neither, of letting its cinephile concept snuff out anything authentic. But while I鈥檓 not, at the moment, begging for a subsequent French New Wave movie set in Saskatchewan, I鈥檝e not gone long without thinking about 鈥淯niversal Language.鈥� I guess Rankin鈥檚 movie dream has filtered into those of my own.
鈥淯niversal Language,鈥� an Oscilloscope Laboratories. release, is not rated by the Motion Picture Association. In Farsi and French. Running time: 89 minutes. Three and a half stars out of four.
Jake Coyle, The Associated Press
