Invisible Driver

Abba Kiarostami is widely regarded as one of the most innovative directors working today. Lorena Cancela talked to him about nature, cars and the disengagement of the filmmaker.

Lorena Cancela: In Through the Olives Trees one of the ideas that struck me after seeing the film is the relationship between life and movies. What is the difference between life and movies, if there is any?

Abbas Kiarostami: It is a difference between something that is fabricated and something that is true, or the difference between something that is framed and something that is true. What I try to do is to make films that are really close to the truth, but this is just an attempt, it is a try. I try to, it doesn't mean I am successful. Real success is being able to document life; I don't think I have been extremely successful in this try, but I am trying to continue to develop. During the course of the filming something occurs outside of the original script, or the original screenplay. For me, those moments represent real success, the moments you can document.

In Close Up Sabsyan says that Mosen Makhmalbaf's film The Cyclist has changed his life. What is the idea behind that?

As a filmmaker I really don't have the right to comment on this question, it is up to the audience to decide whether or not a film has the ability to change somebody's life. As a professional filmmaker I do believe that some films have the ability to alter the course of one's life, or to develop a different part, but this is purely as professional. The parameters that affect people's life are so vast, a film doesn't have the power that these other parameters to alter the course of one's life. But they can have an effect on people and their professional life.

The full article is printed in Film Ireland 96