There is no privilege in restriction. In other words, I disagree with people who say restriction makes you more creative. I think that's a misleading….

It's been interesting to see how similar audiences in the East and West are, actually, and how it makes you realize that when politicians emphasize t….

I like storytelling movies and more than that I like historical movies; and I think someday I'll definitely make a movie about the past 50 years hist….

When we talk about self-confrontations, we are speaking about moral issues rather than social issues..

When I came to know theater, drama became valuable to me..

I really think that people who want to think more serious have to go and watch theater. Theater is a very sterilized art form. Not as much as music, ….

I gained a great deal from the period during which I worked in theater and I value those things a great deal..

We always have the movies that are more toward real life, but they don't have that much drama or suspense, or we have the full of drama or suspense, ….

I see screenwriting as a bit like a math equation which I have to solve..

Because I write the screenplay entirely and precisely, there is the danger that an actor might feel that this finite role is being imposed on them. I….

I prefer to stay in my country. But this doesn't mean if someone does want to leave Iran, I think they've done something wrong - the desire to leave ….

It's very difficult to talk about religion in Iran because religion has gotten so mixed up with politics..

I like storytelling, and for storytelling you need a drama. And for there to be drama, you need twists, and by twists I mean the ability to constantl….

It's not some big event that creates the drama, it's the little things of everyday life that bring about that drama..

When I decide to write a story, I don't think too much about what I want it to be, I just let things come naturally and this is how it turns out. It'….

The fact that I do place music at the end of my films is not to accentuate the emotion. It serves an opposite purpose which is to remove them from th….

Poetry, especially traditional Iranian poetry, is very good at looking at things from a number of different angles simultaneously..

Sometimes we feel like life is like theater, really..

Classical tragedy was the war between good and evil. We wanted evil to be defeated and good to be victorious. But the battle in modern tragedy is bet….

The bigger confrontation is the one an individual has with itself..

Often times, music is used to evoke an emotion and it's become a cliche, so I don't want to do that, and actually what I do, is that emotional intens….