The film that had the strongest impact on him as a child was Vittorio De Sica’s Bicycle Thieves. At the age of 12, Mehrjui built a 35 mm projector, rented two-reel films and began selling tickets to his neighborhood friends. Although raised in a religious household, Mehrjui said that, at the age of 15, “The face of God gradually became a little hazy for me, and I lost my faith.”