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I don’t generally derive my stories from novels. I try to turn into film things I have felt or experienced.

Abbas Kiarostami

Anything I’ve not experienced I do not look to for a subject. I have to feel it.
ABBAS KIAROSTAMI

Experienced Feel Look Looks Subject
Those same people, when they leave the theater, when they look behind the curtains they are curious about their neighbors, they can guess if their neighbors are siblings or a couple, how old they are, what their occupation is.
ABBAS KIAROSTAMI

Couple Curtain Guess Neighbour People Sibling
The experience of life teaches us that being like someone in love is more real, because everything is uncertain.
ABBAS KIAROSTAMI

Experience Life Love More Real Teach Uncertain
I prefer the countryside to cities. This is also true of my films: I have made more films in rural societies, and villages, than in towns.
ABBAS KIAROSTAMI

City Village Film Prefer Society Town True
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

Actor Character Directing Film Large Real Very
I think being someone in love is so hard to define, so temporary, because retrospectively we often deny the state in which we were in love.
ABBAS KIAROSTAMI

Complication Deny Expression Life Perception Thinking
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

Car Film Friend Home Intimate Location Office
There were years when Hitchcock was like a master to me, but now I think he’s so artificial. I can watch films and say how technically beautiful they are, but I’m not impressed by any technicality.
ABBAS KIAROSTAMI

Artificial Beautiful Hitchcock Master Saw Technically Thinking Year
I think that in life, being is nothing but an illusion. If we acknowledge that and accept the fact that we are in between states, that we are moving, and this movement is the nature of our lives
ABBAS KIAROSTAMI

Able Accept Acknowledge Illusion Moving State Thinking
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

Carpentry Contentment Doe Giving Spend Wood
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

Character Know Not People Real Well
My films have been progressing towards a certain kind of minimalism, even though it was never intended. Elements which can be eliminated have been eliminated.
ABBAS KIAROSTAMI

Element Eliminated Film Kind Minimalism Progress Progressive
I remember when I came out of an exam thinking I had done well and then I had a clue that maybe one answer was wrong, I remembered that I rather stop knowing, stop thinking about it, appreciating life instead.
ABBAS KIAROSTAMI

Answer Appreciate Clue Exam Memories Remember Thinking Wrong
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

Cinema Lazy Life People Punctuation Seat
Children are very strong and independent characters and can come up with more interesting things than Marlon Brando, and it’s sometimes very difficult to direct or order them to do something.
ABBAS KIAROSTAMI

Character Children Independent Interesting Marlon Brando Strong
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

Cinema Giving Grandchildren Lesson Life Opportunity

I don’t generally derive my stories from novels. I try to turn into film things I have felt or experienced.

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I don’t generally derive my stories from novels. I try to turn into film things I have felt or experienced.

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Popular Authors

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