‘Universal Language': A trilogy of Iranian-accented tales set in Canada
This is not as insane as it sounds. Well, it is, but stay with me. Matthew Rankin, a Manitoba-born, Montreal-based experimental filmmaker, so loves the Iranian New Wave movies of the 1970s and beyond — the films of Abbas Kiarostami, Mohsen and Samira Makhmalbaf, Jafar Panahi, and others — that he has ported their neorealist style, situations and language to the icebound terrain of a make-believe Winnipeg. All the men call one another 'Agha' here, a Farsi term of respect that extends behind the camera as well.
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Miiro Borneta, Barcelona hotel review
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