Review: An Iranian filmmaking scion charts his own path with whimsical ‘Hit the Road’

Iranian cinema in all its poetic humanity is on lovely display in Panah Panahi’s “Hit the Road,” a charmingly offbeat, meaningful journey across remote spaces that follows a tight-knit Tehran family of four entering unfamiliar territory. This fraught mission — one that must cross the mind of everyone suffering under Iran’s brand of authoritarian rule — is less an engine of typical narrative suspense, however, and more a dramatic construct so Panahi can paint a picture of family dynamics when colored by the most heartbreaking kind of urgent togetherness. What transpires is an exquisitely controlled yet diverting blend of pre-mourning and in-the-moment pleasures, a tonal blend of miraculous balance for a first-time filmmaker, even one with Panahi’s one-of-a-kind training. And as the landscape changes from dry, dusty flatness to mist-covered mountain passes, Panahi’s depth-conscious framing of his characters against nature and Amin Jafari’s crisp, dreamlike cinematography shift the atmosphere further, to something almost otherworldly.