Directed by Abbas Kiarostami • 1970 • Iran
Starring Reza Hashemi, Mehdi Shahravanfar
“The mother of all my films,” according to Abbas Kiarostami, starts out as a breezily observed anecdote about a boy wending his way home through Tehran alleys carrying a loaf of bread. Variations on both the boy and the old man he sees and begins to follow will factor into future Kiarostami films, as will the use of “dead time,” the journey structure, and the poetic articulation of space. The final scene, involving a dog and a door, ends things on a note of wry ambiguity.
Up Next in Directed by Abbas Kiarostami
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Breaktime
Directed by Abbas Kiarostami • 1972 • Iran
Starring Sirous HassanpourDisciplined at school for breaking a window, a boy joins throngs of his schoolmates as they make a cacophonous exit into Tehran’s streets. He then briefly joins an impromptu soccer game but disrupts it by stealing the ball and...
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Experience
Directed by Abbas Kiarostami • 1973 • Iran
Starring Parviz Naderi, Hossein Yarmohammadi, Andre GovalovishBased on a story by Amir Naderi, who also cowrote the film, this slice of a fourteen-year-old boy’s life follows his efforts to fend for himself in the big city, working as a tea server and ...
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The Traveler
Directed by Abbas Kiarostami • 1974 • Iran
Starring Hassan Darabi, Pare Gol AtashjamehAbbas Kiarostami’s first feature focuses on a boy in a provincial city so avid to get to Tehran to see a soccer match that he’ll lie to adults and cheat other kids. A quest film that’s also a study of youthful...
