Window Horses

Finding your own voice through the magic of poetry

“All good cows go to heaven…”

Rosie Ming, a young Canadian poet, is invited to perform at a poetry festival in Shiraz, Iran, but she’d rather go to Paris. She lives at home with her over-protective Chinese grandparents and has never been anywhere by herself. Once in Iran, she finds herself in the company of poets and Persians who tell her stories that force her to confront her past: the Iranian father she assumed abandoned her and the nature of poetry itself. 

The film’s voice actors include Sandra Oh (Rosie), Ellen Page (Kelly, Rosie’s best friend), Don McKellar (a young poet named Dietmar), Shohreh Aghdashloo (Mehrnaz, a professor at the University of Tehran) and Nancy Kwan (Gloria, Rosie’s overprotective grandmother). More than a dozen animators, including Kevin Langdale, Janet Perlman, Bahram Javaheri and Jody Kramer, worked on the film with Fleming.

"Window Horses takes a sensitive, subtle, and playful look at building bridges between cultural and generational divides. It’s a film about being curious, staying open, and finding your own voice through the magic of poetry. It’s a film about identity and the imagination."

- Ann Marie Fleming (from the WH Press Kit)

CREDITS

The Cow Poem credits:
Animation by Kunal Sen
Music and Sound by Taymaz Saba

Window Horses credits:
Written and Directed by Ann Marie Fleming
Executive Producer: Sandra Oh
Producer: Ann Marie Fleming, Stickgirl Productions
Co-Producers: Shirley Vercruysse and Michael Fukushima for the NFB
Cast: Sandra Oh, Ellen Page, Shohreh Aghdashloo, Don McKellar, Omid Abtahi, Navid Neghaban, Nancy Kwan, Eddy Ko, Payman Maadi

Window Horses

OFFICIAL TRAILER

PROCESS

Initial exploration

Alternate colour theme

Animated tile exploration

Prizes and awards

Ann Marie Fleming is an Asian-Canadian filmmaker and visual artist.