Close-up

Abbas Kiarostami’s (‘The Taste of Cherry’, ‘Through the Olive Trees’) ‘Close-Up’ is part of a remarkable body of films from Iran that address, in very original ways the artifice of cinema and the uneasy junction between life and art. Approached like a documentary, ‘Close-Up’ tells the true story of Hossein Sabzian, an unemployed movie buff who is mistaken for renowned Iranian director Mohsen Makmalbaf (‘Gabbeh’, ‘Moment of Innocence’), and decides to take the misunderstanding further, by deceiving a middle-class Iranian Family. Eventually his fraudulence is exposed and he is faced with a potential jail term. Blurring the line between fact and fiction further is Kiarostami himself who interviews the protagonists involved in this unbelievable story, culminating in Sabzian’s trial which Kiarostami films. Interestingly enough, Makmalbaf (who appears in ‘Close-Up’), has his own freakish experience of truth informing fiction, which became the subject matter for his wonderful film ‘Moment of Innocence’. ‘Close-Up’ also features a short by Italian director Nanni Moretti, called “The Day of the Premiere of ‘Close-Up’”, which pays humorous tribute to Kiarostami and ‘Close-Up’. In Farsi with English subtitles.