P4 Time-Image Research ProjectP4 THEATER · DELEUZE
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Abbas Kiarostami / 阿巴斯·基亚罗斯塔米 · 1990

Close-Up

Nema-ye Nazdik

Sabzian enters a family as ‘Makhmalbaf,’ and trial footage plus reenactment asks the actual participants to perform themselves. No single judge settles identity as true or false; the camera follows how a lie produces relations, shame, and creative desire.

Film details

Original title
Nema-ye Nazdik
Director
Abbas Kiarostami / 阿巴斯·基亚罗斯塔米
Year
1990
Region
Iran

Film analysis: how shots organize concepts

ATLAS MECHANISM BREAKDOWN

Trial, documentary recording, and reenactment make participants perform themselves; truth-testing shifts toward what relations and lives a lie can produce.

A short-haired, bearded man appears in a tight close-up, one side of his face in shadow and gaze lowered.00:54:30
The courtroom image presents Sabzian at once as defendant, performer, and self-narrator.
The same man sits frontally at the centre of a carved wooden sofa, hands joined before white curtains.01:04:30
Reenactment asks the actual participant to play himself again, joining fact and performance in one body.
Two men share a motorcycle; the passenger holds a plant with pink flowers.01:34:00
The meeting carries impersonation into a real relation; failing sound refuses to seal reconciliation as final proof.
  1. 01
    A chance object interrupts inquiry

    As the reporter accompanies police to the Ahankhah home to arrest Sabzian, an aerosol can rolls down the street and the camera leaves people and testimony.

    ‘Finding truth’ no longer monopolizes the image; chance reality retains force of its own.
  2. 02
    Participants perform themselves

    Direct address in court intersects with reenactment of the first visit; Sabzian is defendant, actor, and author.

    True and false identities lose a single tribunal and enter a productive series.
  3. 03
    Technical gap keeps the ending open

    Sound repeatedly fails during Sabzian’s motorcycle meeting with Makhmalbaf.

    Reconciliation is arranged and accidental; incomplete sound refuses to certify a final real.
Atlas analysis · evidence classification unrecorded.
Reading attribution: Hypothesis awaiting shot verification · Sources and locators

Close-reading questions

  1. 01
    As the reporter and police enter the Ahankhah home, the camera stays outside to follow a rolling aerosol can; how does this departure from the newsworthy event first unsettle documentary's centre?
  2. 02
    During the trial, Sabzian explains to the camera why he impersonated Makhmalbaf; when does testimony shift from answering the judge to an accused man actively composing his own image?
  3. 03
    Sabzian and Makhmalbaf reenact their meeting and ride to the Ahankhah home as faulty sound breaks their speech; how does technical damage make the arranged reconciliation appear at once as real encounter and cinematic performance?

Analysis and scene sources

Shots and scenes

Read the 3 shot checkpoints above: stills, analysis, and viewing positions

Primary texts, scholarship, and locators

Theory coordinate: Atlas analysis; theoretical basis: Cinema 2, Minnesota 1989, ch. 6, pp. 143–155; ch. 7, pp. 156–157

  1. 01
    Cinema 2: The Time-Image

    Authoritative source for the standard translation, translators, ISBN, and publication date.

    Open the atlas source record →
Consult the primary-text locator above.
Douban film searchsearch.douban.comBilibili film searchsearch.bilibili.com

This film in books and research

Gilles Deleuze : cinéma et philosophie · Atlas analysis

Close-Up

Marrati pp. 111–118 · site test

Film relation: This site tests Close-Up through Marrati's account of life-choice, relation to the world, and a missing people: Sabzian is at once defendant, performer, and a person rearranging his relations through cinema.

Shot question: How do courtroom address, reenactment by the participants, and the final motorcycle encounter successively alter who may speak for the real? Why does damaged sound prevent reconciliation from becoming a final verdict?

Conclusion: The film appoints no final judge between true and false; lie, performance, and technical rupture jointly produce a new real relation.

Viewing gateways and editions

  1. Verified complete Bilibili carrier: 阿巴斯·基亚罗斯塔米 高分电影【特写 (1990)】中文字幕bilibili.comOpen film page ↗
    Page access
    Accessible when checked
    Version extent
    Recorded as a complete version
    Source type
    User-uploaded page

    Edition note: Chinese subtitles · complete single-part film · 1:38:00.

    Link checked: 2026-08-14

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  2. Criterion Collectioncriterion.comOpen film page ↗
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    Distributor or streaming platform

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Concepts, terms, and further reading

Concept and term tests

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