The actors come and you start seeing things happen for real.

The actors come and you start seeing things happen for real.

I think happy and hope is more hopeful when you acknowledge that there's awful things too.

I like to give the actors the freedom, and they know they have the freedom, to change anything they want at any time.

I believe in the utmost importance of one human being's actions toward another. This is actually what I believe in. How we handle one another, that's what makes us feel isolated, feel like outsiders sometimes. These questions are overwhelming. "What do you do in this world?" I believe in that more than anything.

So much can be learned by any filmmaker by studying his work, in terms of blocking, staging, editing and sound.

I like poetry, but honestly, I like dramatic literature more. If I had to pick between Rumi and Dostoevsky, I would pick Dostoevsky without even thinking about it. Ninety-nine out of 100 Iranians would probably pick Rumi. Kiarostami, too, would probably pick Rumi first. I try to have the meaning be in the action of the story, not in the symbolism. I want it to be in the action, and it's dramatic action that creates the meaning.