Opens February 21 | In this charming, surreal, and snowy second feature from Matthew Rankin (THE TWENTIETH CENTURY), the official language of Canada is Farsi. Winner of the inaugural Directors’ Fortnight audience award at the Cannes Film Festival, UNIVERSAL LANGUAGE is a collection of interconnected storylines: two young girls are determined to melt money they’ve found frozen in the ice, a guide gives a modest and measured tour of Winnipeg, and a melancholy man (Rankin) returns home from Montreal to reunite with his family. Paying homage to the work of Abbas Kiarostami, Roy Andersson, and Guy Maddin (with a dash of Wes Anderson), UNIVERSAL LANGUAGE is a witty, warm portrait of human connection, never mind the cold. Dialogue: director Matthew Rankin following the Friday, February 21, 6:00 p.m. screening.

Awards & Nominations

Winner - Directors' Fortnight Audience Award, Cannes Film Festival 
Winner - Arthouse Cinema Award, Hamburg Film Festival
Winner - Best Director, Stockholm Film Festival
Winner - FIPRESCI Prize, Viennale

5 QUESTIONS WITH MATTHEW RANKIN

Interview from the January/February 2025 Gazette

UNIVERSAL LANGUAGE, which is delightfully and surprisingly influenced by Iranian cinema, is playing at the Film Center in February, the same month as our 36th Festival of Films from Iran. Who and what are some of your favorite Iranian filmmakers and films?
Sohrab Shahid Saless is a filmmaker I think a lot about. He has slipped into a certain amount of obscurity—and I’ve only ever seen warped VHS dubs of his work on YouTube— but his influence is monumental. I believe Abbas Kiarostami’s first masterwork, WHERE IS THE FRIEND’S HOUSE, is full of lessons gleaned from Saless’s A SIMPLE EVENT. On another note, I have become obsessed with the animated films produced by the Kanoon Institute. A few months ago Pirouz Nemati, my friend and collaborator on UNIVERSAL LANGUAGE, showed me an amazing cut-out animated short by V. Fard Moghadam called LI LI HOZAK, and I’ve been thinking about that one a lot too. Its very gentle message of inter-species solidarity, as a full menagerie of animals mobilize their respective talents to rescue a helpless chicken from drowning. It is one which really resonated for Pirouz and I and for the film we made together.

In UNIVERSAL LANGUAGE, you also step in front of the camera, as the introverted Matthew. What did you learn about yourself, directing yourself?
I learned I am a very needy actor who requires constant mothering. I will never work with myself again!

The Film Center welcomes a strong audience of students studying film and endeavoring to thrive within the industry. What is one piece of advice you’d give these students?
Always make movies with your best friends, never wear a Napoleon hat, and try to get into some love triangles.

What is a memorable moviegoing experience you’ve had?
The Marx Brothers film DUCK SOUP is my happiest early memory of movie viewership. As a freakish eight-year-old, I could perform a gesture-to-gesture choreographic replica of both the Groucho and Harpo parts of the “Mirror Scene.”

What film do you watch again and again?
Three movies I rewatch every so often to remind myself why I am doing what I am doing are: Steven Soderbergh’s SCHIZOPOLIS, Mohsen Malhmalbaf’s A MOMENT OF INNOCENCE, and John Waters’s PECKER.

The Film Center is ADA accessible. This presentation will be projected without open captions. The theater is hearing-loop equipped. For accessibility requests, please email filmcenter@saic.edu