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 KIAROSTAMII’m still very grateful to digital cameras in general, but I didn’t have this feeling with the RED one.
More Abbas Kiarostami Quotes
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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.
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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.
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Everybody knows that I am not usually patient enough to actually sit down and watch one of my own films from the beginning to the end – I never do.
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In my opinion the man looks at the relationship in a more bitter fashion and the woman still holds great hopes.
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I do believe in [Robert] Bresson’s method of creation through omission, not through addition.
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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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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.
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I am still very surprised that I managed to make that film [Close Up]. When I actually look back on that film, I really feel that I was not the director but instead just a member of the audience.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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As film-makers, it is very important for us to find common ground between cultures, and maybe that’s less the case for politicians who benefit more from finding the conflicts and differences between us.
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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.
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In my experience as a director, I think there is obviously something of the way men – maybe that’s a common point with Shirin – the way men see women in the film, and the way these two characters see each other.
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I thought that I had been asked every kind of question possible.
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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.
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I have a picture from the end of the shoot, and in it I have lost all my hair.
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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!
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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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The Iranian government as a whole has no relationship with my films. They’re not particularly interested, perhaps this kind of cinema is not very interesting to them.
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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.
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I never really learned photography.
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There are certainties in existence, but love is something much harder to define than light and dark, life and death. I think saying you are “like” someone in love sounds right.
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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.
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In order to be universal, you have to be rooted in your own culture.
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Having an international voice is not really about whether we speak Persian or any other language.
ABBAS KIAROSTAMI