As one of very few women directors working in Iran, how difficult for you is it?

Traditionally, it is in the minds of everybody that a woman cannot be a film maker. It is therefore very much harder for a woman. Also, when you live in this kind of situation there is a danger that you can start to develop a similar mind-set and so the thing is to challenge this situation, and then slowly the situation will change also in the minds of others. I very much hope that in the advent of freedom and democracy Iran can produce many more women directors.

Has the strict censorship regime that is practised in Iran forced you to be more creative with the way in which you present your ideas?

Yes, you try to find another way in terms of the available language of cinema of expressing yourself. It is also often wise to begin from the idea and then think about how best to represent this idea visually. One of the benefits of censorship is that we have been allowed to develop our own cinematic language in Iran. Don't forget that Iran is one of the few countries because of legislation where Hollywood cannot export, so we have in many ways avoided some cinematic clichés and found more personal ways of expressing the ideas which we have.

With the advent of films such as "A Time For Drunken Horses", "The Color Of Paradise", and "The Wind Will Carry Us" in the West a new wave of Iranian cinema has been defined. Are you aware of any such movement?

Firstly, don't forget that because of censorship a lot of the films that you have mentioned, particularly those of Mr Kiarostami, have not been seen in my own country so like many of my people I only become aware of them when I travel. I would also have to say that we have been producing films in Iran for a hundred years and that the quality of the films we have produced has been consistently high. So conversely, just as many of the great films make it out of Iran, many of them do not. There are many fine films by many fine directors that have never left our shores so there has always been for me a very good body of work. The quality of the films which Western audiences have discerned in the last ten years or so is not to me anything new.

How important an influence has your father (the acclaimed director Mohsen Makhmalbaf) been on you?

Well I acted from an early age in his films, particularly "The Cyclist" and I worked with him on his films as an assistant director. I realised very quickly that directing was what I wanted to do. From him I also learnt the confidence to articulate what I felt that I had to say, and that in cinema it is sometimes best to feel as if you know nothing. To start again afresh with each film as if you're seeing everything for the first time.

Read more about the challenges of making "Blackboards".