And Then We Danced (MIFF 2019) director Levan Akin’s Teddy Jury Award–winning follow-up is a luminous salute to the various communities of Istanbul.

Retired schoolteacher Lia deeply regrets not being a better ally to her estranged trans niece Tekla. Having promised her late sister that they would reconnect, Lia sets out to track down Tekla in the sprawling, transcontinental Turkish city. Her unlikely companions in this mission are hapless young man Achi and, in time, fearless lawyer and proud trans woman Evrim. As all three converge, what starts out as a road movie becomes more than a mere search for a loved one.

In his fourth feature, the Swedish-Georgian director once again showcases both traditional dance and modern club beats, casting a spell over his audience with the help of scene-stealing performances from Georgian cinema stalwart Mzia Arabuli as Lia, Deniz Dumanli as Evrim and newcomer Lucas Kankava as Achi. Evoking a mythical quest even as it homes in with sharp-eyed realism on Istanbul at the street level, Crossing is an affecting film about queerness, connection and the importance of intergenerational solidarity in forging our senses of self.

“Akin brings beauty to the back streets and back waters of the Bosphorus in Crossing, an elegy of travel and trans life which ebbs and flows between Georgia and Istanbul … Dream-like.”– Screen Daily