OUR MUSIC aka NOTRE MUSIQUE

Year: 2004
USA: Wellspring
UK: Optimum Releasing
Cast: Sarah Adler, Nade Dieu, Rony Kramer, Simon Eine, Jean-Christophe Bouvet, George Aguilar, Leticia Gutierrez, Lana Schulmann, Ferlyn Brass, Elma Dzanic, Lana Baric, Jean-Luc Godard, Mahmoud Darwich, Juan Goytisolo, Jean-Paul Curnier, Pierre Bergounioux, Gilles Pequeux
Director: Jean-Luc Godard
Countries: France / Switzerland
Languages: French / English / Spanish (English Subtitles)
USA: 80 mins
UK: 79 mins
UK Certificate: 12A contains moderate images of war, injury and death
USA Release Date: 24 November 2004
UK Release Date: 10 June 2005 (Limited Release -wider)
UK Release Date: 20 May 2005 (Limited Release -London)
US Distributor

Synopsis

Shot and Reverse Shot
Imaginary: Certainty
Reality: Uncertainty
The Principle of Cinema:
Go Towards the Light and Shine it on Our Night
Our Music
Part poetry, part journalism, part philosophy, Jean-Luc Godard's OUR MUSIC aka NOTRE MUSIQUE is a timeless meditation on war as seen through the prisms of cinema, text and image. Largely set at a literary conference in Sarajevo, the film draws on the conflagration of the Bosnian war, but also draws on the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, the brutal treatment of Native Americans, and the legacy of the Nazis.

OUR MUSIC is structured into three Dantean Kingdoms: "Hell," "Purgatory" and "Heaven." In the film, real-life literary figures (including Arab poet Mahmoud Darwich and Spanish writer Juan Goytisolo) intermingle with actors; and documentary meshes with fiction. OUR MUSIC also follows the parallel stories of two Israeli Jewish women, Judith Lerner (Sarah Adler) and Olga Brodsky (Nade Dieu); one drawn to the light and one drawn towards darkness.

Through evocative language and images, Godard explores a series of conflicting forces:
death; life
dark, light;
good; bad
negative, positive;
real; imaginary;
activists; storytellers
vanquished; victor;
criminals; victims;
suicidal; hopeful
shot, reverse shot.
These opposing movements are eternal. They are the two faces of truth.
They are our music.