Metacritic reviews

Universal Language is a magnificent film, one that feels warm and familiar even as we realize just how startlingly original it is.

Everything from the film’s humanist energies, down to the timbre of the dialogue, rings like an endearing, never-labored homage to Persian cinema.

The story navigates the fine line between community pride and nationalistic zeal, providing lessons for a future while admitting to the existential futility of it all. We can shift our perspective, but every time we do, things stay pretty much the same.

Universal Language is first and foremost a testament to the shared artifice of all filmic storytelling, and to the singular realities it’s able to bring alive in turn.

An off-kilter creation that feels like the wacko offspring of Aki Kaurismäki and Abbas Kiarostami’s cinemas.

Rankin may have conceived Universal Language in the spirit of homage, but there’s something undeniably original about the end result. Don’t be surprised if that translates into a modest cult following and more creative ideas in the future.

The film is so gloriously absurd that we are mainly driven through the narrative by the continuous reveal of new elements in this bizarre and hilarious universe. Still, when everything does come together at the end, there are some emotional payoffs that sneak up on you like a wandering turkey.

Blending autobiographical elements with heartfelt homages to Iranian cinema, writer-director Matthew Rankin's charmingly surreal comic fable reimagines Canada as a Farsi-speaking dreamland.

Though juxtaposing Canada’s drabness and relative lack of heritage with Iran’s millennia of unbroken tradition brings out the former aspects particularly clearly, Universal Language is aiming beyond mere satire or culture-clash playfulness.

You could call it whimsical. Absurdist. Contrived. Or an unexpectedly unusual concept album that doesn’t quite come off but was worth the effort. And you would be correct every time.