Homage to
Abbas Kiarostami

Abbas Kiarostami (Tehran, 1940 – Paris, 2016) was one of the most important directors, screenwriters and visual artists of contemporary cinema, a central figure of Iran’s second “nouvelle vague” and a leading author of international auteur cinema. After studying at the Faculty of Fine Arts in Tehran, he began working as an advertising graphic designer and an illustrator for children’s stories and fairy tales. His exposure to children’s literature reveals a shared language between the director and children, which will permeate his entire filmography. Before devoting himself entirely to cinema, he worked on commercials, experimenting with an original filming style based on improvisation and devoid of the typical gimmicks of advertising. From the outset, his films stood out for their essential, austere style, blending fiction and documentary and prompting viewers to question the relationship between reality, truth and representation.

His career as a filmmaker began in 1970 with the short film Nan va Koutcheh, but, after a long series of shorts, the work that brought him international recognition was Khane-ye doust kodjast? (Where Is the Friend’s House?, 1987), a touching story about a child who tries to return a notebook to a classmate without knowing his home address.

It is the first chapter of the so-called “Koker trilogy” — which also includes Zendegi va digar hich (And Life Goes On, 1992) and Zire darakhatan zeyton (Through the Olive Trees, 1994) — in which Kiarostami depicts rural Iran and reflects on cinema itself. And Life Goes On follows a filmmaker who, after the 1990 earthquake, travels through the affected areas looking for the young actors from the previous film; in Through the Olive Trees – awarded with the golden Rosa Camuna at the 1995 edition of Bergamo Film Meeting – a man and a woman play a couple in love, but while the actor is really in love, the actress rejects him.

Prominent among his seminal works is Nema-ye nazdik (Close Up, 1990). This film-essay reconstructs a famous Iranian news case: a man posing as filmmaker Mohsen Makhmalbaf to infiltrate the life of a middle-class family. By having the real protagonists interpret the story, Kiarostami blurs the boundaries between documentary and fiction, crafting one of the most influential films in the history of modern cinema.

International recognition finally came with Ta’m e guilass (Taste of Cherry, 1997), winner of the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival, the story of a man who wanders around Tehran in his car looking for someone willing to help him die. The film perfectly embodies Kiarostami’s cinema: open, philosophical, capable of raising questions without providing definitive answers.

Another milestone is Bad ma ra khahad bord (The Wind Will Carry Us, 1999), set in a Kurdish village where a film crew waits for an elderly woman to die so they can document her funeral rites. A haunting and contemplative film, it reflects on time, waiting, and the intangible, and was awarded the Grand Jury Prize at the Venice Film Festival.

In the early 2000s, Kiarostami furthered his search for new forms with a series of more radical films. Dah (Ten, 2002) is built around ten conversations filmed almost entirely inside a car, with a woman driving and talking to various passengers. Using minimal staging, the film tackles issues such as the status of women in Iran, divorce and individual freedom. This experience is linked to 10 on Ten (2004), an educational and introspective film in which Kiarostami reflects on his own work, explains the artistic and theoretical choices behind Ten, and offers a first-hand insight into filmmaking.

In With Five Dedicated to Ozu (2003), a tribute to Japanese master Yasujirō Ozu, Kiarostami creates five long, static shots filmed by the sea, in which human presence is minimal or absent. Devoid of dialogue and consisting solely of images and natural sounds, the film represents one of the purest expressions of his contemplative cinema.

In the following years, Kiarostami worked increasingly more often outside Iran. In Europe, he directed Copie conforme (Certified Copy, 2010), filmed in Tuscany and starring Juliette Binoche and William Shimell, an encounter between a woman and a writer that turns into an ambiguous game of roles and identities. The film earned Binoche the award for Best Actress at the Cannes Film Festival. With Like Someone in Love (2012), set in Tokyo, Kiarostami explores loneliness and alienation through the unexpected relationship between a young female student and an elderly teacher.

His last work, 24 Frames (2017), completed shortly before his death, is a sort of an artist’s testament: twenty-four paintings inspired by photographs and paintings, in which movement and sound transform static images into meditations on time, nature and the act of looking.

Throughout his career, Abbas Kiarostami directed many documentaries that constitute a significant part of his artistic research. These films examine reality from a raw, open perspective, constantly questioning the boundary between what is performed and what is real. Films such as Mashgh-e Shab (Homework, 1989), in which Kiarostami engages in dialogue with children and families about the Iranian education system, or ABC Africa (2001), in which he follows a group of children in Uganda to investigate life and its challenges in Africa, showcase Kiarostami’s attention to childhood, ethics, and the inner workings of society.

Kiarostami was also a poet, photographer and visual artist, with his work exhibited in major international museums such as the MoMA in New York, the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, the National Museum of Cinema in Turin and, posthumously, the Centre Pompidou in Paris. However, he will be remembered above all as a seminal figure in international cinema, a master at transforming simplicity into profundity and turning film into a space for poetic, ethical and universal meditation.