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Abbas Kiarostani Photo By Pedro J Pacheco

Top 10 fun Facts about Abbas Kiarostami

Abbas Kiarostami was born on June 22, 1940, in Tehran Iran and died on July 4, 2016, in Â鶹APP, France. He has worked extensively as an Iranian film director, screenwriter, film editor, art director, and producer. He has been an active filmmaker since 1970.

He has been involved in the production of over forty films, both shorts and documentaries. His film Where is the Friend’s Home? Close-up and The Wind Will Carry Us were amongst the 100 best foreign films in a 2018 critics poll by BBC Culture.

1. He Brought More Trophies and Glory to Iran

Abbas Kiarostani Photo By Pedro J Pacheco

Abbas has won the admiration of audiences worldwide and this made him win more Awards and brought glory to Iran. He has won over 70 awards in his career. Some of these awards include;

Jury Special Award for The Bread and Alley at the 5^th Tehran International Festival of Films for Children and Young Adults, Iran 1970, First Prize in Narrative Category for The Experience at the 4^th Giffoni International Film Festival, Italy 1974, First Prize for Two Solutions for One Problem at the International Film Festival, Taste of Cherry selected as the Best Film of the Year by Time magazine in 1997 and the Golden Dolphin of Kish Island for Lifetime Achievement in Cinema, Iran 2000.

2. He had Unique Specific Styles he Used in his Movies

Kiarostami’s cinemas were unique and unusual. He used his specific styles in his movies. His Movies were always compared to Rosselini’s neo-realistic works for involving life destruction and death.

Unlike many filmmakers, Abbas liked to work with children and non-professional actors. This is one fun fact about him since many filmmakers prefer to use professional actors with years of experience and few children for their movies to be perfect.

He was very selective and he featured depicted aspects of life in his films such as death or open endings. He wanted to be unique and deliver different things.

3. Abbas was the Iranian Director Regularly Invited to Worldwide Festivals

The innovative filmmaker was one of the Iranian directors regularly invited to worldwide Festivals due to the good work he produced before he gained international recognition with his film ‘Where is The Friend’s Home? in 1987.

He has well encouraged younger directors to follow his styles to be able to access the international film circuit. He spent a lot of his time with the younger filmmakers and organized many workshops to teach them filmmaking

4. Iranian Film Director

Abbas Kiarostani Photo By Pedro J Pacheco

Abbas Kiarostami was an Iranian film director who uses unique styles in his film and comes up with a new ideas. He was innovative in his film production and he avoided copyright and produced original films.

The director has achieved an international reputation for his movies. He has been making films since 1970, he first won international recognition with his film ‘where is the Friend’s House?  the film won him the Bronze Leopard award at the 1988 Locarno International Film Festival in Switzerland.

5. Directed Kanun Film Production

Abbas Kiarostami Photo By Tasnim News Agency

Kanun was an organization founded with the support of Farah Diba, wife of Iran’s then-monarch, Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi. Abbas become co-director of the cinema department in the new Center for the Intellectual Development of Children and Adolescents known as Kanun in 1969. His interest in making films developed while he worked at Kanun.

 His first film to be direct in Kanun was Bread and Alley which was produced in 1970, he used his unique style of making films such as using children and non-professional actors among others in the film. He as well made several feature films for Kanun with this unique style before the Iranian Revolution of 1979. ‘The Traveler’ is the 1972 movie most known in and outside of Iran. After the revolution, Abbas continued to direct Kanun’s film production and made several of his films between 1979-1985.

6. HE Come From Painter Family

He was born in a middle class family in Tehran. His father, Ahmad was a painter of frescoes on walls and ceilings. Abba’s as he grew up he look after his father and wished to be a painter and designer.

when he was 18 he won an art competition and he joined university of Tehran and specialized in painting and graphic design.

7. He has Inspired Many Iranian Director

This is one of the amazing facts about Abbas. Even though there another commercial film industry in Tehran that makes movies for entertainment and profit, even imitates the popular genres of similar films out of Hollywood has no audience beyond Iran.

However, many of Iranian directors have been inspired by Kiarostami due to the unique technics and styles he uses in making films and has adapted his techniques to make serious films that become famous and go beyond Iran and attract serious attention both inside and outside of Iran.

8. Despite Being a Filmmaker, he had Studied Arts

Abbas Kiarostami Photo By Tasnim News Agency

It is fun to know that despite Abbas being a famous and successful filmmaker he had studied art at the University. Abbas’s first artistic experience was painting. During his late teens time, he continued to Paint and participated and won a painting competition at age of 18. He later left home and Joined the University of Tehran School of Fine Arts.

In the university, he majored in painting and graphic design. He financed his education by working as a traffic policeman. In the 1960s, Abbas worked in advertising, designing posters and creating commercials since he was a painter, designer, and illustrator. From 1962-1966, he got a good deal and advertised around 150 advertisements on Iranian television.

9. Directed over 40 Films

Abbas Kiarostami Photo By Tasnim News Agency

Abbas has been involved in over forty films involving shorts and documentaries. He has been an active filmmaker since 1970 after leaving his artistic work aside. Some of the films he has directed include;

Close Up (1990), Taste of Cherry (1997), The Wind Will Carry Us (1999), Where is the Friend’s Home? (1987), And Life Goes On (1991), The Bread and Alley (1970), Shirin (2008) and Homework (1989) among others.

10. He Extended his Success to other Directors

When Kiarostami gained worldwide recognition, he did not forget his followers. He organized many workshops for younger filmmakers and spent most of his time with them to teach them about filmmaking, and things to do and avoid to be successful.