Mohammad Rasoulof s The White Meadows is a mesmeric, discomforting journey - punctuated by enigmatic motifs and metaphors - through a nightmarish bleached-white landscape of barren salt marshes. Defying any genre, the fable-like tale follows the odyssey of a man who sets out by boat to collect the tears of the inhabitants scattered across an archipelago of stark, inhospitable islands on a nameless sea.

Camera (color): Ebrahim Ghafouri.
Editor: Jafar Panahi.
Music: Mohammad Reza Darvishi.
Production & Custom designer: Shahram Karimi.
Sound: Amir Hosein Ghasemi, Mohammad Mokhtari;.
Assistant director: Daryoush Ebadi.
Reviewed at San Sebastian Film Festival (competing), Sept. 19, 2009. Running time: 93 MIN. (less info)