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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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Abbas Kiarostami
Age: 75 †
Born: 1940
Born: January 1
Died: 2016
Died: January 1
Actor
Cinematographer
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Film Director
Film Editor
Film Producer
Graphic Designer
Illustrator
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Teheran
Lost
Evening
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Scripts
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More quotes by Abbas Kiarostami

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Film is very much a universal and common voice, and we can't limit it to one particular culture.
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I had intended to make another film, called Pocket Money, which was to be about children at a school. I was very much intrigued by the story [of Close Up] - it came into my dreams and I was very much influenced by it. So I called my producer and asked that we put aside Pocket Money and start something else, and he agreed.
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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.
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I thought that choosing a non-professional was a condition for me, because it would allow Juliette to have a less-professional way of acting. It would challenge her performance as a professional actress.
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I don't have very complete scripts for my films. I have a general outline and a character in my mind, and I make no notes until I find the character who's in my mind in reality.
Abbas Kiarostami
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In real life, when someone's partner calls them, they can tell from the first word their partner says what their mood is.
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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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With the RED, I didn't have this impression at all. I felt that it was as heavy as a film camera. Having this great crew, with the DP and his assistants, I found it making as much of an impression as a very big film camera. I didn't relate to it as much. I remember avoiding it during the shooting rather than paying attention to it.
Abbas Kiarostami
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I spend a lot of time doing carpentry. Sometimes there is nothing that gives me the contentment that sawing a piece of wood does.
Abbas Kiarostami
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I do think that we are sometimes, as directors, guilty of portraying or asking our actors to behave in certain ways that are perhaps not very morally acceptable. I'm not the only one.
Abbas Kiarostami
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I really haven't seen The Report in a long time. I don't have a copy, but I'll have to see it again. I think it would be good to put both these men next to each other.
Abbas Kiarostami
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I never really learned photography.
Abbas Kiarostami
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I really think that I don't mind people sleeping during my films, because I know that some very good films might prepare you for sleeping or falling asleep or snoozing. It's not to be taken badly at all.
Abbas Kiarostami
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A movie is about human beings, about humanity.
Abbas Kiarostami
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I only make notes, I don't write dialogues in full. And the notes are very much based on my knowledge of person.
Abbas Kiarostami
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Good cinema is what we can believe and bad cinema is what we can't believe. What you see and believe in is very much what I'm interested in.
Abbas Kiarostami
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Anything I've not experienced I do not look to for a subject. I have to feel it.
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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My car is my best friend. My office. My home. My location. I have a very intimate sense when I am in a car with someone next to me. We're in the most comfortable seats because we're not facing each other, but sitting side by side.
Abbas Kiarostami
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Cinema gives you the opportunity to be both a grandparent and a grandchild whereas in life you cannot be both at the same time.
Abbas Kiarostami