Chris Flackett
It’s not often that we encounter a contemporary Western release, especially from Canada, that acts as a loving nod to the films and directors of the Iranian New Wave, but in Universal Language, the astonishingly good second feature film from director Matthew Rankin, that’s exactly what we have.
Rankin has made no secret of the influence of Abbas Kiarostami, among others, on his filmmaking style, and here he takes things that one step further, imagining a Winnipeg that has, magically and without explanation, found itself merged with elements of Iranian culture, people, and the Farsi language to create an absurdist, semi-liminal space that is of the world and beyond it. It’s an attempt at a reconciliation between the two countries to, in particular, enrich Rankin’s own native Canada, of which his films tend to serve as a critique.
There are two threads we follow throughout; in the first, two sisters of school age, Negin and Nazgol, find a 500 ‘Riel’ bill (Riel here standing in for the Iranian Rial) frozen in the ice. The local tour guide, Massoud (Pirouz Nemati), sends them on a wild goose chase to find a tool to break the ice, leading the pair to encounter many of the city’s quirky residents.
In the second thread, Matthew (played by Rankin himself) quits his job working for the government of Quebec and returns home to Winnipeg to visit his sick mother, only to find that things are not what they seem. The two threads come together in the end in a moment of circularity, identity crisis and, perhaps, hope. Maybe acceptance. Universal Language, like the best absurdist or surrealist cinema, does not explain itself. It’s a film you instinctively feel.
First and foremost, Universal Language is a very funny people. I have seen other reviews that make comparison with Wes Anderson, although most people seem to be coming out on the side of Rankin. I’d concur with that; while Universal Language’s characters are no less quirky than those found in a Wes Anderson film, they also feel less forced, less self-conscious. For all its absurdity, the world of Rankin’s film feels natural to itself: you can believe this place and these characters exist, however irrational and unlikely they may seem.
With its mix of melancholy, dry absurdist humour, and Brutalist architecture forming the backdrop, Universal Language struck me more as a Persian-Canadian version of the films of Swedish director Roy Andersson. Some of the characters we meet—a man who we never see as he gives directions from inside a Christmas Tree; a wheelchaired butcher in a pink cowboy hat who reads poetry to his turkeys; a young student dressed up as Groucho Marx; a briefcase on a bench growing stems that is claimed to be a “UNESCO heritage site”—could all have spilled out of the frames of You, The Living or A Pigeon Sat On a Branch, Reflecting On Existence.
Where Rankin differs with Andersson, at least in Universal Language, is that Rankin’s humour feels a touch less black—there’s more empathy here for and between the characters. Moreover, Andersson tends to frame his films as a collection of sketches or vignettes featuring repeating characters. Universal Language is a definitive, multi-layered narrative, and while the meanings behind that narrative are not always clear, ultimately Rankin’s film feels that little bit more satisfying for following its path to a definite conclusion.
On a personal note, my wife is half-Iranian (although brought up in the UK); her maternal side of the family are fully Iranian. As such, it was lovely to hear Farsi (which, although I don’t speak it, I recognise certain basic words), and to see such strange yet familiar sights as the Persian decor that takes over the Winnipeg branch of Tim Hortons. I realised that the Persian part of my life is ingrained in me more than I thought, and that actually, while there are a lot of Iranians who have made lives for themselves in the West (of relevance here, a 2021 census for Canada revealed 200,460 Iranians lived int he country), their lives and their culture, as lived and mixed with the West, are often not depicted on screen. Where I live, in Manchester, England, there is a high level of multi-culturalism, and it is not unusual to see old English building and western shops mix with and stand next to mosques and small independent shops and eateries dedicated to Asian and African residents.
This kind of multi-cultural, everyday urban existence is not often depicted on-screen for people of Iranian heritage. Universal Language takes steps towards correcting this, and presents us with a wonderful absurdist fable, with plenty of heart, into the bargain as well.
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