6th March 2011; Abbas Kiarostami's CLOSE-UP

Close-Up
A film by Abbas Kiarostami
Year:1990
Country:Iran
Persian with English subtitles
6th March 2011; 5.45 pm
Perks Mini Theater . Perks School

Close-Up (Nema-ye Nazdik, 1990) was perhaps Abbas Kiarostami’s most critically-acclaimed film, and yet it was apparently something of an opportunistic spur-of-the-moment production that was made without much prior planning.
Close-up opens to a shot of a newspaper reporter (Hossein Farazmand) fetching two police officers on a taxi to go to a house on Golzar Street. A mild mannered, unassuming man (Hossein Sabzian) is led away by the officers as the reporter goes door-to-door in search of a tape recorder for the exclusive interview.
All of the characters are portrayed by themselves, and the story is based of events that actually transpired. The newspapers provide a glimpse into the chaos of the scene - an announcement on the arrest of a "bogus Makhmalbaf" - and Kiarostami (off-camera) begins to conduct interviews with the parties involved.
It is Mr. Sabzian's poignancy that makes "Close-Up" much more than a clever reflection on film-versus-life as an endless hall of mirrors. A transcendent humanist in the tradition of the Italian neo-realists and the Indian director Satyajit Ray, Mr. Kiarostami has made a film that looks into the heart of a man accused of a crime and, instead of evil, discovers only sweetness, longing and a sad confusion.

It is a searingly honest and intensely personal moment for the reverent Sabzian and gracious Makhmalbaf, that the question arises: are we still watching a film or real-life unfold before us? To Abbas Kiarostami, it is all one and the same phenomenon - a captured moment in the evolving document of life.
(Source: Internet)

Abbas Kiarostami

Abbas Kiarostami was born in Tehran, Iran, in 1940. He graduated from university with a degree in fine arts before starting work as a graphic designer. He then joined the Center for Intellectual Development of Children and Young Adults, where he started a film section, and this started his career as a filmmaker at the age of 30. Since then he has made many movies and has become one of the most important figures in contemporary Iranian film. He is also a major figure in the arts world, and has had numerous gallery exhibitions of his photography, short films and poetry. He is an iconic figure for what he has done, and he has achieved it all by believing in the arts and the creativity of his mind.
(Source:IMDB )