I think life is so difficult to catch, it’s so furtive, that a copy, a film, can in no way catch it and represent it.
ABBAS KIAROSTAMII 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.
More Abbas Kiarostami Quotes
-
-
I’m still very grateful to digital cameras in general, but I didn’t have this feeling with the RED one.
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 have somewhat lost my enthusiasm in the last years. Mainly because film students using digital video these days have not really produced anything which is more than superficial or simplistic; so I have my doubts.
ABBAS KIAROSTAMI -
I have no advice for anyone on how to live.
ABBAS KIAROSTAMI -
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 -
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 -
When I’m in the process of making a movie I’m not thinking about the finished result, and whether people have to see it once or more than once, and what the reaction to it will be. I just make it, and then I live with the consequences.
ABBAS KIAROSTAMI -
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 -
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 -
Close-Up is a very particular film in my oeuvre. It’s a film that was made in a very particular way; mainly because I didn’t really have the time to think about how to go about making the film.
ABBAS KIAROSTAMI -
If you are a businessman or a politician in Iran, you can get a visa as quickly as you ask for it.
ABBAS KIAROSTAMI -
If we’re not going to take full advantage of digital, then 35mm is a better medium. Especially for shooting dramas – I have no problem with 35mm.
ABBAS KIAROSTAMI -
Whether you consider me a master filmmaker or not, I do it with my intuition and my vision, my experience as a storyteller.
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 -
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