Director Matthew Rankin, actors Ila Firouzabadi and Pirouz Nemati, and producer Sylvain Corbeil discuss Universal Language, an NYFF62 Currents selection, with NYFF programmer Tyler Wilson.

With deadpan, absurdist charm, Manitoban filmmaker Matthew Rankin triangulates a group of interconnected storylines set in a wintry, bleakly beautiful Winnipeg. Two kids discover a bank note frozen in a block of ice, which they hope to retrieve to buy their classmates a new pair of glasses. A tour guide brings befuddled visitors on a walking tour of the city’s modest environs. A melancholy man (Rankin, in an autobiographical role) returns home from Montreal to reunite with his family after many years. Imagining a city in which Farsi is the predominant language, Rankin’s visually and narratively inventive film was inspired by Iranian films of the 1970s, frequently humanistic children’s fables, in this case transferred to a world of beige, concrete brutalist buildings and increasingly surreal, Tati-esque humor. Winner of the Directors’ Fortnight Audience Award at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival. An Oscilloscope release.

NYFF62 Currents features are sponsored by MUBI.

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