How to Make Use of Leisure Time: Painting – A Film NOT by Abbas Kiarostami

How to Make Use of Leisure Time: Painting (1977), a short educational documentary widely credited to and distributed as a film by Abbas Kiarostami, has nothing to do with him. He is not the director of this film.

Currently, MK2, which holds the international rights to the Kiarostami catalogue owned by Kanoon, rents this film as a Kiarostami work. Who first misattributed it, and why—whether intentionally or by mistake—is unclear. But here’s my guess:

Most of Kiarostami’s pre-revolutionary films were unavailable during his lifetime. After his passing, a deal was struck, and through MK2’s initiative, the negatives were taken out of the country and restored in Bologna and Paris. How to Make Use of Leisure Time was mistakenly listed as a Kiarostami work in Masoud Mehrabi’s 1990s guide to Iranian documentary films, even though Kiarostami’s name appears nowhere in the credits.

This error, compounded by the absence of the filmmaker himself to dispute it, likely led to the film’s restoration under his name. Now, every major reference site—including IMDb—wrongly classifies it as a Kiarostami film.

But who actually made the film?

Koroush Afsharpanah. He was the head of education at Kanoon and, in 1977, appeared in the leading role of Kiarostami’s The Report, which was produced outside Kanoon. Afsharpanah also directed films, including this one. His name appears in the credits, though Kanoon films often listed credits in a modern, collective style—either alphabetically or without specifying individual roles. Some argue this reflected a general disregard for proper crediting at Kanoon, but after examining many of their films where credits were handled professionally, I believe it was an artistic choice. Kiarostami’s team, in particular, functioned almost like a radical, Dziga Vertov-style collective when it came to authorship.

To settle this ongoing mistake once and for all, I called Koroush Afsharpanah—reminding me of the miracles a simple phone call can achieve. He confirmed:

"Yes, I am the director of that film, though we collaborated on the script with Kiarostami, who was head of the educational films department."

[For clarity: Afsharpanah came from the education department, while the educational films department – headed by Kiarostami – was a separate entity.]

Now, who will correct the thousands of erroneous webpages?