Quote

I think violence can never be justified. At the same time, nobody’s culture or beliefs should be insulted, that’s not something I can accept either. But I cannot justify or accept any violence at all.

Abbas Kiarostami

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Abbas Kiarostami
Age: 75 †
Born: 1940
Born: January 1
Died: 2016
Died: January 1
Actor
Cinematographer
Contributing Editor
Film Director
Film Editor
Film Producer
Graphic Designer
Illustrator
Painter
Photographer
Teheran
Thinking
Violence
Either
Culture
Insulted
Cannot
Justified
Something
Justify
Never
Beliefs
Time
Accept
Think
Nobody

More quotes by Abbas Kiarostami

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In this type of cinema, whether working with actors or non-actors, as much as you do direct them, if you allow yourself to be directed by them, then the end result will be much more pleasing. The real and individual strengths of the actors is allowed to be expressed and is something that does affect the audience very deeply.
Abbas Kiarostami
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I think I really produce my best work in Iran.
Abbas Kiarostami
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Cinema seats make people lazy. They expect to be given all the information. But for me, question marks are the punctuation of life.
Abbas Kiarostami
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All the different nations in the world, despite their differences of appearance and religion and language and way of life, still have one thing in common, and that is what's inside of all of us. If we X-rayed the insides of different human beings, we wouldn't be able to tell from those X-rays what the person's language or background or race is.
Abbas Kiarostami
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When I talk to some of the younger filmmakers, they are so worried about their films that, eventually, this state of being worried reflects itself in and helps the final work. Whereas, with projects that are meticulously planned, you look at the end result and it is full of emptiness.
Abbas Kiarostami
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Religion works on some people but not on everyone, because it says, 'Stop thinking and accept what I tell you.' That's not valid for people who want to think and reflect.
Abbas Kiarostami
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When I find the character, I try to spend time with them and get to know them very well. Therefore my notes are not from the character that I had in my mind before, but are instead based on the people I've met in real life.
Abbas Kiarostami
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This kind of directing, I think, is very similar to being a football coach. You prepare your players and place them in the right places, but once the game is on, there's nothing much you can do - you can smoke a cigarette or get nervous, but you can't do much.
Abbas Kiarostami
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The day we run out of petrol is the day Iran will be free.
Abbas Kiarostami
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In the total darkness, poetry is still there, and it is there for you.
Abbas Kiarostami
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A movie is about human beings, about humanity.
Abbas Kiarostami
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My way of expression is full of complications and mystery because that's my perception of life.
Abbas Kiarostami
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In order to be universal, you have to be rooted in your own culture.
Abbas Kiarostami
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I prefer the films that put their audience to sleep in the theater. Some films have made me doze off in the theater, but the same films have made me stay up at night, wake up thinking about them in the morning, and keep on thinking about them for weeks.
Abbas Kiarostami
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I was mentioning with the digital camera, maybe this new fashion of filmmaking gives a closer look of what life may be like. But it's still nothing but a copy.
Abbas Kiarostami
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If I do continue to have the opportunity to work in Iran, that's very much what I'd prefer to do.
Abbas Kiarostami
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I never intended to write poems, nor to be a photographer, nor to be a film-maker. I just took many, many pictures and I would put them in an album, and then some years later I decided to show them and suddenly I was called a photographer. Same thing with my poetry. They're notes that I'd written in a book and it may be considered poetry.
Abbas Kiarostami
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I did not have a script [of Close Up]. I made notes in the evenings and we filmed during the day over 40 days.I didn't sleep a wink for those 40 nights. I have a picture from the end of the shoot, and in it I have lost all my hair.
Abbas Kiarostami
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It's very true that non-actors feel more comfortable in front of a digital camera, without the lights and the large crowd around them, and we arrive at much more intimate moments with them.
Abbas Kiarostami
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If you are a businessman or a politician in Iran, you can get a visa as quickly as you ask for it.
Abbas Kiarostami