Born in Mianeh in 1960, Jafar Panahi regularly attended Kanun (Institute for the Intellectual Development of Children and Young Adults), where he discovered the films of Abbas Kiarostami. After studying directing at the Tehran Higher School of Television and Cinema, he made several short and medium-length films and documentaries for Iranian television. In 1992, he directed a fiction film, The Friend, a tribute to Kiarostami’s first short film, Bread and the Street. In 1994, he was hired as an assistant on the film Through the Olive Trees. In 1995 he directed his first feature film, The White Balloon, based on a screenplay by Kiarostami.
Jafar PANAHI
Director
