UNIVERSAL LANGUAGE (UNE LANGUE UNIVERSELLE) After Dark

Both screenings to be followed by a conversation with filmmaker Matthew Rankin and writer and producer Ila Firouzabadi.

Winner of the first-ever Directors’ Fortnight Audience Award in Cannes, the delightfully offbeat second feature from Canadian filmmaker Matthew Rankin (THE TWENTIETH CENTURY) imagines a parallel universe somewhere between Winnipeg, Montreal and Tehran, where the dominant language is Persian, and all signs are in Arabic script. In an affectionate tribute to classic child-centered Iranian films, Omid finds himself, in the middle of winter, arriving late to class after a prize turkey has run off with his glasses. Though hope emerges when two of his classmates, Negin and Nazgol, discover a 500 Riel bill frozen in a puddle of ice and resolve to somehow retrieve it to buy Omid a new pair of glasses. With co-writers Pirouz Nemati and Ila Firouzabadi, Rankin constructs this astoundingly unique and heartfelt childhood romp, interweaving a poetic meta-narrative sure to tug on the heartstrings of anyone who understands coming to appreciate a far-away country through the lens of cinema. –Malin Kan