Tehran – The 2004 genre look Godard film “Our Music” will be screened on Friday at the Iranian Artist Forum (IAF) in Tehran.
The 80-minute film, scheduled for 6pm, will be exhibited with Persian subtitles at IAF’s Naseri Hall, Irna reported.
It is a meditation of three chapters (hell, purification, paradise, paradise) in Sarajevo about the Bosnian War, Palestine and Israel, and the war itself.
The film reflects the expression of violence, morality and violence in film, particularly touching on past colonialism and current Israeli-Palestinian conflicts. It was screened from the competition at the Cannes Film Festival in 2004.
The film is divided into three parts inspired by Dante’s sacred comedy. “Realm 1: Hell” is a relatively short, non-narrative montage made up of natural documentaries and fictional footage of stories depicting war, genocide and violence.
The second segment, “Realm 2: Purgatory,” constitutes a large part of the film. Playing himself, Godard is waiting to depart for the European Arts Congress in Sarajevo at the airport. There he meets Ramos Garcia, a nationalized French Israelite, and goes to a meeting as an interpreter. Ramos looks forward to meeting his nie, Olga Brozky, a French-speaking Jew of Russian descent. Another young woman at the conference, Judith Lerner, a journalist from Tel Aviv, visits the French ambassador and pleads for a record-breaking conversation about Jewish relations with Palestinians. She then interviews the poet Mahmoud Darwish. He says Israel defines the Palestinian struggle. During these encounters, Judith investigates the city and visits the Mostar Bridge, where Emmanuel Levinas is read.
Meanwhile, Olga attends Goddard’s lectures on the relationship between images and texts, on the surface. In addition to touching on various other topics, Godard makes a break between the two characters in conversation and exchange, explaining his opposition to the looting of a common film in “Shot/Reverse Shot.” Godard explains that presenting the two characters in such a way can be framed in the same way, regressively annihilate differences, and used as a propaganda tool. Olga then meets with his uncle Ramos and discusses with him about the philosophical issues of suicide.
After the meeting, Godard returns home and waters the garden. He receives a call from Ramos Garcia. Ramos Garcia tells Godard about the young woman he encountered at the theater, declaring that she had a bomb in her bag. She sought one person to die with her for peace in Israel and Palestinians. Everyone left the theater. The police came and shot her. When they opened her bag, all they found was a book. Garcia tells Godard that he is sure it is Olga.
In “Realm 3: Heaven,” Olga, a short postrude, wanders pondering the idyllic lakeside environment that appears to be protected by the American Marines.
Jean-Luc Godard (1930-2022) was a French and Swiss film director, screenwriter and film critic. He rose to prominence as a pioneer of the French new wave film movement of the 1960s along with filmmakers such as François Truffaut, Agnaise Varda, Eric Romer and Jacques Demi. He was definitely a postwar French filmmaker.
He is said to have “produced one of the biggest groups of critical analysis by filmmakers since the mid-20th century.” His work is central to narrative theory, “challenging both the cinematic norms of commercial narratives and the vocabulary of film criticism.” In 2010, Godard won the Academy Honorary Award.
SS/SAB