I don't generally derive my stories from novels. I try to turn into film things I have felt or experienced.

I have received the digital camera as a blessing. It has really changed my life as a filmmaker, because I don't use my camera anymore as a camera. I don't feel it as a camera. I feel it as a friend, as something that doesn't make an impression on people, that doesn't make them feel uncomfortable, and that is completely forgotten in my way of approaching life and people and film.

If you are a businessman or a politician in Iran, you can get a visa as quickly as you ask for it.

I didn't just see myself as a film director here [in Life And Nothing More], but also as an observer of people who had been condemned to death.

Those same people, when they leave the theater, when they look behind the curtains they are curious about their neighbors, they can guess if their neighbors are siblings or a couple, how old they are, what their occupation is. They are curious about each other and they can understand each other without being fed information. Why should it be different in cinema?

When I talk to some of the younger filmmakers, they are so worried about their films that, eventually, this state of being worried reflects itself in and helps the final work. Whereas, with projects that are meticulously planned, you look at the end result and it is full of emptiness.

I only make notes, I don't write dialogues in full. And the notes are very much based on my knowledge of person.