76 Minutes and 15 Seconds with Abbas Kiarostami / Take Me Home

With his more than forty films – including Close-up, The Taste of Cherry, Certified Copy and the Koker trilogy – legendary Iranian director Abbas Kiarostami (1940-2016) is one of contemporarycinema’s most respected film artists. This new documentary comes in the wake of his death in 2016 at an age of 76 years and 15 days.

By no means a traditional run-through of the artist’s life and work, 76 Minutes... is a compilation of footage shot by longtime friend and collaborator Seifollah Samadian. The result is a portrait, both intimate and poetical, of a meticulous and perfectionist artist with a humble and light-hearted demeanor and a thirst for all the beauty that life has to offer. A published poet, writer, photographer and installation artist, Kiarostami had a wide range of artistic abilities. Animated by an almost childlike joy, Kiarostami documents the landscape with a keen photographic eye for the expressive, the beautiful and the absurd. We follow him out on a beautiful winter’s day in the Iranian countryside, and see him feed a flock of geese by the seaside on the set of his film Five. We watch and listen as he recites poetry on a plane and teaches Juliette Binoche to speak Iranian.

Kiarostami’s careful, open-ended esthetics subtly questioned Iranian culture, as well the relationship between truth, fiction and lies, paving the way for a younger generation of Iranian filmmakers such as Jafar Panahi. 76 Minutes... touchingly documents the bonds of affection and respect that bring Iranian filmmakers of different generations together. Chloé Faulkner

76 Minutes... will be preceded by Kiarostami's short feature Take Me Home, a collage of stills and digital animation. This poetic and absurd little tale of a child’s ball rolling down an endless series of steps, appears to be a tribute to Albert Lamorisse’s The Red Balloon, and showcases Kiarostamis exquisite sense for visual composition.

Seifollah Samadian (b. 1954) is an Iranian director and cinematographer. He graduated from studies in English literature, and has worked as a photographer since before his film career started. Samadian has directed a number of short documentaries, and was a cameraman for Abbas Kiarostami on films such as Five and ABC Africa.