You are here

Home / Explore film & TV / Films, TV and people

10 (2002)

Conversations in the front seats of a car driving around Tehran comprise Abbas Kiarostami’s moving essay on the place of women in Iranian society.

Stills must not be reproduced, copied or downloaded in any way. Hard copies of some images can be bought via the BFI Printstore and the complete collection can be accessed for commercial reuse via BFI Stills.

Film details

Alternative titles

  • DIX Alternative French

Introduction

“The key achievement of this minimalist statement is that Kiarostami conveys these truths with nothing more than a simple two-camera setup and a series of naked emotions.”
Ed Gonzalez, www.slantmagazine.com, 2002

Iranian filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami achieved acclaim on the 1990s film-festival scene, but confounded many critics with this ultra-minimalist drama about a woman (Mania Akbari) driving around Tehran, picking up various passengers as she goes.

As her son, her sister, a woman on her way to prayer, and others all take turns in the passenger seat, Kiarostami intimately films ten conversational episodes from a small digital camera fixed to the dashboard. From this simple concept emerges a complex picture of the oppression of women in modern Iran. In 10’s most subversive moment one passenger momentarily removes her headdress, both character and actor thereby breaking Iranian law. It’s a poignant example of Kiarostami’s customary play on the boundaries of fiction and reality.

Also on the busy streets of Tehran, Kiarostami’s early featurette Fellow Citizen (1983) portrays a traffic policeman’s exasperated efforts to divert vehicles from a restricted zone.

Cast & Credits

Sight & Sound logo

The Greatest Films of All Time 2012

Voted for by 3 critics.

See who voted for 10
 

You are here

Home / Explore film & TV / Films, TV and people

Back to the top