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Having an international voice is not really about whether we speak Persian or any other language.
Abbas Kiarostami
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Abbas Kiarostami
Age: 75 †
Born: 1940
Born: January 1
Died: 2016
Died: January 1
Actor
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Film Director
Film Editor
Film Producer
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Teheran
Speak
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Persian
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More quotes by Abbas Kiarostami
The starting point and the ending point are nothing but two arbitrary choices. You make them as in soccer games, where they chose that it's 90 minutes, not less and not more. But the choices are the responsibility of the filmmaker. You have to choose to join the story at an arbitrary point, and you leave it at an arbitrary point.
Abbas Kiarostami
I think it was [Jean-Luc] Godard who said that life is nothing but a bad copy of film, but then our ambition must be to make better films and better shapes of forms that are given in life.
Abbas Kiarostami
The film [Close Up] made itself, to a large extent. The characters involved were very real, I wasn't directing the actors so much as being directed by them. So it was a very particular film.
Abbas Kiarostami
We are nothing but a link between our culture and what we can actually produce.
Abbas Kiarostami
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
In my mind, there isn't as much of a distinction between documentary and fiction as there is between a good movie and a bad one.
Abbas Kiarostami
I would be too selfish if I said everyone should see my movies more than once. To say that would mean I'm just marketing my work!
Abbas Kiarostami
It seems that film-makers are being divided between those working in digital and those who are not. I think it's not something predetermined - it all depends on what project we have in mind, and on that basis we choose the medium.
Abbas Kiarostami
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
Of the hundreds of points to enter and exit that are offered to me, I have to choose the one that I feel is the least wrong, the least fake. It is fake, it is a moment that I choose to erupt the story, but I make it as smooth as I can. What enables me to do it is the skill of filmmaking.
Abbas Kiarostami
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
Maybe more than a teller, I am a story listener. I really enjoy listening to stories. I remember them and keep them in my mind. All of my films are a collection of small stories that have been told to me.
Abbas Kiarostami
I believe there's only good cinema and bad cinema.
Abbas Kiarostami
In real life, when someone's partner calls them, they can tell from the first word their partner says what their mood is.
Abbas Kiarostami
Unfortunately, cinema critics are very few in America, 400-500 people, but there are more critics of Iran.
Abbas Kiarostami
I didn't just see myself as a film director here [in Life And Nothing More], but also as an observer of people who had been condemned to death.
Abbas Kiarostami
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
I think I'm no different to my friends who are doctors or businessmen or architects - we all started watching films of the golden age together. But whether I'm making films or writing poetry or doing photography, it's very much rooted in my sense of unease. And that's really where everything goes back to.
Abbas Kiarostami
It's not so much a question of whether we've shot it through 35mm or digital video what is important is whether the audience accepts it as real.
Abbas Kiarostami
In order to be able to cooperate with a child, you have to come down to below their level in order to communicate with them. Actors are also like children.
Abbas Kiarostami
