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Cinema gives you the opportunity to be both a grandparent and a grandchild whereas in life you cannot be both at the same time.
Abbas Kiarostami
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Interpretation

What this quote means

Cinema allows for exploration of multiple perspectives and experiences simultaneously, unlike real life.

This quote suggests that cinema has a unique ability to transcend the limitations of time and experience by allowing viewers to inhabit different roles, such as that of a grandparent and a grandchild, at once. It highlights the immersive and transformative power of film to present narratives that intertwine various life stages, offering a rich scope of understanding that is not possible in the actual flow of life.

Themes

CinemaExperienceLifePerspectiveNarrative

In practice

Example use cases

A filmmaker discussing the emotional depth of their latest work at a film festival.

More from Abbas Kiarostami

Digital photography is, by definition, unfinished. You don't feel that after every 24 or 36 shots you have to change your film - you know you can go on for ever if you want. You can see the result immediately, and find out if your original idea is worth going on with or not, whether it can be corrected, whether it can be improved.
Abbas KiarostamiRead
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.
Abbas KiarostamiRead
From my very first movie, what was my concentration, my inspiration, was I didn't want to narrate something, I didn't want to tell a story. I wanted to show something, I wanted for them to make their own story from what they were seeing.
Abbas KiarostamiRead
Good cinema is what we can believe, and bad cinema is what we can't believe.
Abbas KiarostamiRead
As film-makers, it is very important for us to find common ground between cultures, and maybe that's less the case for politicians who benefit more from finding the conflicts and differences between us.
Abbas KiarostamiRead
The calling of art is to extract us from our daily reality, to bring us to a hidden truth that's difficult to access - to a level that's not material but spiritual.
Abbas KiarostamiRead

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