Among intrusive and sought-after memories, a woman hears a disconcerting call from the depths of her being. A cryptic cry for help that becomes intelligible guides her to the original wound, to her inner child, becoming her own protector.

“City of Tigers” is based on the 1896 novel by Knut Hamsun and is widely considered to be the world’s first modern novel. The main character is a starving artist roaming the streets of Oslo during the present-day pandemic, a situation that only exacerbates his feeling of estrangement from a society that is separated from him. On his travels, he meets a host of characters who both help and impede him and follows a woman he met in his previous life who he names Yljali, after a fictitious Iranian princess. The artist desperately searches for authenticity in his work even if it means he might not survive. This film is an unapologetic love letter to the city that “leaves its mark on all who have lived there”.