"Roads of Kiarostami" is, even if it is already 10 years old, a fairly recent work by Iranian filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami. He started his career over 35 years ago before he made this one. It is mostly in black-and-white and runs for over half an hour. In here, Kiarostami proves he is not only a talented writer and director, but also succeeds as a narrator. There are a couple good moments in here, but I personally think it may have been better and more essential at 15 minutes max. Kiarostami uses dogs again in here, just like in some of his older films, especially the very early short films. The good thing is that this film never seems pretentious, but it never seems too relevant either. It is one of these films that probably has a much bigger impact on the big screen, but seeing it there is almost impossible these days. I cannot recommend "Roads of Kiarostami". Thumbs down.
2 Reviews
Self-indulgent film by a great director
Red-12525 August 2020
Warning: Spoilers
Here are the full cast and crew of Roads of Kiarostami (2006): Directed by Abbas Kiarostami; Writing Credits: Abbas Kiarostami; Cast: Abbas Kiarostami Self (uncredited); Cinematography by Abbas Kiarostami; Film Editing by Abbas Kiarostami. (Actually, there's a cinematographer listed as well, but his work only appears for a minute or two, when he's recording Abbas Kiarostami.)
In 2006, Kiarostami was an established international film director. He could afford to make this self-indulgent film. What we see are black-and-white still photos of roads. Not particularly interesting roads. Mostly roads running through barren landscape. Once in a while we see a person, or a flock of sheep, or a horse. Once we see a dog, and Kiarostami gets out of the vehicle and is filmed photographing the dog.
At the very end of the movie, we see one of the photos being burned and we see this in color! And that's the end of the movie.
We saw this film on DVD. It's possible that the movie would have worked better in a theater, but I don't think so. The film has a fairly weak IMDb rating of 6.8. I didn't think it was that good. I rated it 5.
P.S. The movie was included as an extra in the Cinema Guild DVD of Kiarostami's film Shirin.
In 2006, Kiarostami was an established international film director. He could afford to make this self-indulgent film. What we see are black-and-white still photos of roads. Not particularly interesting roads. Mostly roads running through barren landscape. Once in a while we see a person, or a flock of sheep, or a horse. Once we see a dog, and Kiarostami gets out of the vehicle and is filmed photographing the dog.
At the very end of the movie, we see one of the photos being burned and we see this in color! And that's the end of the movie.
We saw this film on DVD. It's possible that the movie would have worked better in a theater, but I don't think so. The film has a fairly weak IMDb rating of 6.8. I didn't think it was that good. I rated it 5.
P.S. The movie was included as an extra in the Cinema Guild DVD of Kiarostami's film Shirin.
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