"So,in the time of fables..." "KINGDOM 1" " HELL afterthe floods and the rains... armed men crawled out of the ground and exterminated one another." "They´re horrible,here, with their obsession about beheading people." "What amazes me is that there still are survivors." "Forgive us ourtrespasses... as we forgive those who trespass against us." "Yes." "As we forgive, forgive us." "Yes." "As we forgive, forgive us." "We can face death in two ways;" "one,as the impossible of the possible... another,as the possible of the impossible." "well, "I" is another person." "KINGDOM 2" " PURGATORY" "Are you here for the European Book Meetings?" "I thought you made movies." "They asked me to give a lecture to the Academy students." "A lecture about what?" "Text and image." "well, what happened?" "The flight to Zagreb will be late." "actually, if your father was in the Egyptian Communist Party he must have met Henri CurieI." "Yes." "And he followed his same path." "The same path?" "Your father died?" "Yes." "But not as CurieI?" "No, his death was an exception." "By "same path" you mean what?" "Both were born to the burgeoisie... had a careless youth, studied with the Jesuits... got to know the misery of the Egyptian people, and then... felt the same indignation against rabbis, kings, parents, everyone." "And he went to France?" "As an exile?" "He was a militant... was arrested and spent a year and a half in prison." "What about your mother?" "She was in the Zionist branch." "I´II check it up with the airline." "Okay." "She was on the Iast train from Cairo to jerusalem." "She went to jerusalem in 1948, by train?" "In 1948, on the Iast train." "And the Exodus happened on a ship." "Not every exodus is an Exodus." "What about school, your education?" "Did you study in israel?" "No, because we soon left israel." "And since my father was... a big francophiIe, we left israel and I was educated in France." "Did you enlist in the French Army?" "No, I served in israel." "So you went back there by yourself?" "Yes." "With your mother?" "No, really by myself." "Yes?" "And after the military?" "During my stint in the Army..." "I found out I´d become a Frenchman." "After I was discharged I went back." "Did you find work in France?" "As an interpreter." "French, Hebrew, Russian, Spanish, Portuguese." "And what brings you here now?" "The European Book Meetings." "I´m also looking after my niece, that..." "My sister asked me to keep an eye on her." "I think it ´s here." "Departure by Lufthansa in cooperation with Scandinavian Airlines to Munich." "We are calling passengers to proceed to passport and customs control." "Are you sure Mr. Darwich is here?" "He checked in at your hotel." "GoytisoIo wants to see the library." "I speak five languages." "Before his lecture." "What will he talk about?" "The forest of literature." "Who are those people?" "They´re SFOR men." "Today, Germans." "Then Americans, Russians, French, italians and so on." "well, Miss Lerner, have you been stung by the lazy bee already?" "Enough!" "You told me that a while ago and I´ve been wondering:" "why isn´t revolution made by the most humane people?" "Because humane people do not make revolutions, miss." "They make libraries." "And graveyards." "Of course I remember." "When GoytisoIo was here in 1993... that was the first Serbian line." "And they threw bombs from up there?" "Yes." "It wasn´t difficult." "To kill a man to uphold an idea... is not upholding an idea." "It ´s killing a man." ""To kill a man to uphold an idea... is not upholding an idea." "It ´s killing a man."" "When it all ends, nothing is as it was before." "violence... violence leaves the deepest of scars." "The outrage of bloodshed is indelible." "The trust in the world that terror annihiIates is never regained." "To see your neighbor turn against you generates a horror... that clings to your skin forever." "violence interrupted the line of Iife." "The survivor is not just another one." "They´re another person." "The rule is survival." "The nightmare belongs to the ones left stranded." "Everyone is dangerous to others." "The body is a potential weapon." "Everyone knows how to hurt themselves and how to hurt others." "I know that guy." "Rivas!" "It ´s Pierre Bergounioux." "We´ve been togheter in St-Louis." "Take him to Serhat ´s office first." "Right away, Ambassador." "Serhat, Mr. Bergounioux." "The ambassador will see you." "Pierre!" "The israeli reporters are waiting." "They´ve been waiting for 8,OOO years." "What about you?" "I´m here to present a book." "Which one?" ""From Homer to FauIkner"." "tell me, do writers know what they´re talking about?" "could they really know?" "No, of course not." "No, of course not." "Homer knew nothing about battles, massacres, triumphs, glory." "He was blind and bored." "He had to be content in telling about what other people did." "could be." "But there´s a contradiction." "Those who act never have the ability to tell... or think adequately about what they´ve done." "On the other hand, storytellers do not know what they´re talking about." "Think about Mao Tsé-Tung." "It ´s the president." "Rivas, get the car." "Where´s my echarpe?" "What about me?" "My grandfather wrote a letter." "Not to the French ambassador." "To the man." "I don´t understand." "Tomorrow, miss." "Miss?" "Judith Lerner." "What man?" "Lyon, 1943, Gestapo!" "Come with me." "Are you going?" "Why Sarajevo?" "Because of palestine, because I Iive in tel Aviv." "I wanted to see a place where reconciliation seemed possible." "Maybe the "Ha´aretz" won´t even print my story." "That might be." "It will be useful." "For me." "In your office, who´s the girl near Kafka?" "Someone like you, maybe:" "Hannah Arendt." "Her friend SchoIem used to say she looked like 12 synagogues." "During the Ottoman Empire... the hall was rented to what would later become the Jewish Agency." "When I got there, I hung her portrait as a souvenir." "You should read her articles from 195O." "They´re quite enlightening." "As for your grandfather..." "Yes." "In 1943, still a student, you hid a young man and his fiancée." "They were being chased by Vichy´s police." "My mother was born in your... in your little room, in 1945." "After that, they emigrated." "Years later, you were awarded the title of just... but you refused." "You were in college at the time, you only said it was normal." "could be." "I, along with other people, would Iike to set up a meeting." "Not with the French diplomat: with a free man, if you still are one." "Not a just conversation, but just a conversation." "Not about military or political solutions." "About basic problems... with a deep vision." "psychology and morals, nothing else." "Even if I live mainly in New York, I have nightmares." "A friend of mine from Haifa says he doesn´t dream about the enemy... but about himself." "Not about Israel,but about Palestine." "Could we start from there?" "From the land, from the promise... and then get to forgiveness?" "Just a conversation." "Good luck." "To you too." "In the Resistance, did you dream about Germans?" "Or just about France?" "Is this dead language we´ve reanimated really alive?" "What about your French, slowly fading away because of its tedious grammar?" "We´II publish the conversation." "Not even the "Ha´aretz" will accept it." "It ´s not a bad newspaper." "They won´t print it." "I´m a temp." "But I know them." "They´d like to, but they can´t." "They dream about palestine, not about israel." "Time has passed!" "My grandfather has a rich friend." "We´II print 1 or 2 million copies... of that conversation between two friends!" "A dialogue nobody ever starts, not even in their own heart... because the heart is lonely." "A young German catholic said, in 1943:" ""The dream of the individual is to be two." "The dream of the State is to be one."" "She was beheaded!" "Here it is." "Sorry about the mixup, the letter will explain better." "I´m staying at the Inn." "Tomorrow I´II photograph the Mostar Bridge." "My grandfather´s friend has a private jet, he can get here quickly." "I´d have to resign from my office." "Why not?" "I need to think about it." "It ´s... normal." "The world we live in... needs desperately, to subsist... the existence of contemplative people and poets..." "like VaIente Jorge San MaIino." "The light and the submerged... the path of stars and the returning of the submerged... should have reached, in our times..." "leaving those domains to physics... a prodigious identity." ""Nature is a temple in which living pillars... sometimes let confuse words get through." "Man goes through forests of symbols which observe him... with familiar looks."" "If our times have reached an unending force of destruction... we need to make a revolution that creates... an indeterminable force of creation... that strenghtens memories, that outlines dreams... that materializes images." ""If our times have reached an unending force of destruction... we need to make a revolution that creates... an indeterminable force of creation... that strenghtens memories, that outlines dreams... that materializes images."" "That treats better the dead... that reads sumptuosIy the transparence of the ephemeral... allowing the living a swift and safe navigation... through this valley of darkness." ""That treats better the dead... that reads sumptuosIy the transparence of the ephemeral... allowing the living a swift and safe navigation... through this valley of darkness."" "The white man will never understand the ancient words... hearing spirits roaming free between the sky and the trees." "Let columbus scour the seas to find India." "It ´s his right." "He can call our ghosts the names of spices." "He can call us "Red Indians"!" "He can twist all the airs of the north wind." "But outside the narrow world of his map... he can´t believe there are men born equal... the same as air and water." "He took his fill from the flesh of our living, and our dead!" "So why is he bent on carrying out his deadly war, even from the grave... when we have nothing left to give but a few ruinous trinkets... a few tiny feathers to embroider to our legs?" "Isn´t it about time...?" "Isn´t it about time, stranger, for us to meet face to face... in the same age, both of us strangers to the same land?" "Both of us as strangers to the same land... meeting at the tip of an abyss." "Winds will recite our beginning and our end... though our prison bleeds and our days are buried... in the ashes of legend." "Light is the first visible animal from the invisible." "Don´t you ever answer?" "I won´t say anything, it ´s no use." "I won´t say anything." "Find a way for me to talk." "Do you have any idea about what I need to do?" "Convince me you understand me." "Begin, talk to me." "How can I even begin to talk if you don´t understand me?" "Mr. Darwich, from palestine... this is Miss Lerner, a journalist from tel Aviv." "Is it okay?" "Okay, folks, it ´s your play." "Mahmoud Darwich, you wrote... that those who write their own story... inherit the earth of those words." "And when you say... that there is no more room left for Homer... and that you try to be the Trojans´ poet... and you love the vanquished, you begin to talk like a Jew!" "Nowadays... that ´s well accepted." "Truth... has always two faces." "We heard the voices of the Trojan victims... out of the mouth of Greek poet Euripides." "Troy... never told its story." "Does a people or a country... that has great poets... have the right to defeat a people that doesn´t have poets?" "Can a people be strong... without writing poetry?" "I come from a people that wasn´t recognized until recently... and I want to speak for the absent ones... for the poet of Troy." "There is much more inspiration and human richness... in defeat than there is in victory." "If I belonged to the party of the victors..." "I´d take part in the manifestations of solidarity for the victims." "Why are we famous?" "Because... you are... our enemies." "Interest... concentrates on you... not on us." "We had... the misfortune... of having israel... as an enemy." "At the same time... we had... the fortune... of having israel... as an enemy." "You gave us defeat... and recognition." "We act as a propaganda machine for you." "exactly." "The world is interested... in you, not in us." "I don´t have any illusions." "In the article "palestine as a Metaphor"... you wrote: "If they defeat us in poetry... then we are done for."" "But there is another meaning:" "that victory of defeat... cannot be measured in military terms." "Where´s the Paki girl?" "Over yonder, coming down the stairs." "Turkey´s prime minister... compared the minarets to bayonets." "I see language obedient as a cloud." "I see language obedient as a cloud." "If Communism ever existed?" "It did." "Communism existed once, during two 45-minute haIf-times... when Honved, from Budapest, won over england by 6-3." "The english played individually, and the Hungarians, collectively." "Where do you think this picture was taken?" "StaIingrad." "Warsaw." "Beirut." "Sarajevo." "Hiroshima." "No." "Richmond, Virginia, in 1865." "American civil War:" "North against South." "She was a Second Kingdom peasant who claimed she´d seen the Virgin." "When asked what she looked like, Bernadette said, "I don´t know."" "The Mother Superior and the Bishop showed her... pictures of the great religious paintings..." "raphael´s and MuriIIo´s Virgins and so on." "Bernadette says, to all of them, "No, that ´s not her."" "AII of a sudden, comes the Virgin of Cambray, an icon." "Bernadette kneeIs down and says, "It ´s her, Reverend!"" "No movement, no depth, no illusion." "The sacred." "Yes, the image is happiness, but it brings along the emptiness... and all its strength can only express itself through the image." "They say language cuts out objects from reality arbitrarily." "They say that as if we were to blame." "Some of you may have read in French "Phaedra", by Racine." ""When you know about my crime and the fate that burdens me..." "I shan´t die less because of that, I shall die with more guilt."" "Try to see something... try to imagine something." "In the first case, we say, "Look"... and in the second, "close your eyes."" "Shot and reverse are weII-known terms in moviemaking." "But if you look closely these two frames from a Hawks´ movie... you´II see that they´re really a repetition of the same image." "That ´s because the director is incapable... of seeing the difference between a woman and a man." "That gets worse when it ´s two things that resemble each other." "For instance, two recent pictures... representing the same moment in history." "We´II see that, actually, truth has two faces." "If you want to know my opinion, that happens... because books are written by mere storytellers." "BaIzac, in his novels, talked about the inscriptions in the Great Book." "The tablets of the Law, the Sacred Scriptures, the people of the Book." "JEW" "MUSLIM" "For instance: in 1948, IsraeIis get in the water... towards the Promised Land." "PaIestines get in the water to drown." "Shot and reverse." "Shot and reverse." "The Jewish people become fiction." "The palestine people become documentary." "They say facts speak for themselves, and CéIine used to say:" ""unfortunately, not for very long."" "He said that in 1936... because the field of text... had already covered up the field of vision." "In 1938..." "Heisenberg and Bohr were walking through Denmark´s countryside." "They pass by the castle of EIsinore." "The German savant says, "That castle has nothing extraordinary about it."" "The Danish physic replies, "Yes, but... if you say, ´hamlet ´s castle´, then it becomes extraordinary."" "EIsinore: the real." "hamlet: the imaginary." "Shot and reverse." "Imaginary: certainty." "real: uncertainty." "The principle of moviemaking:" "to go to the light... and shine it upon our night." "Our music." "WHAT ABOUT LIBERATION?" "WHAT ABOUT VICTORY?" "THIS WILL BE MY MARTYRDOM" "TONIGHT I´LL BE IN PARADISE" "Mr. Godard, what do you think?" "will the new tiny digital cameras... be able to save the cinema?" "Yes, they all died very young." "The bridge was built during the Ottoman Empire, in 1566 AD... by Master Hairudin, disciple of the great architect Sinan... under SoIiman, the Magnificent." "The town of Mostar is named after it." "In SIavic tongues, "most" means "bridge"." "It ´s called "old Lady", Iike you call a companion or a mother." "people used to meet on the old Lady... and the bravest of them... jumped from the bridge into the greenest waters in the world." "It ´s not just a question of tourist circulation across the Neretva." "We need to restore the past and render possible the future." "To combine suffering with guilt." ""BETWEEN US" Two faces and one truth: the bridge." "That seems difficult." "If the face symbolizes the "thou shalt not kill"... how can you build a face with stones?" "The relationship between me and the other is not symmetric." "At first, I don´t care about what the other is in relation to me." "It ´s their problem." "To me, initially, they´re those for whom I am responsible:" "in this case, a muslim and a Croatian." ""We are all guilty... of everything and everyone... and me more than the others." I forget who said that." "The replacement of stones was done in June, 1997 and August, 1999." "Each slab was identified by a sheet... with all its details:" "position in the water, position within the structure... and a description of each facet where grappIes have been fixed." "It was as if we were discovering the origin of language." "Did you know that, before language was developed in Sumer... to talk about the past, we used the word "after"... and to talk about the future, the word "before"?" "No, I didn´t know that." "I didn´t know that." "I´m going to see the bridge." "I´II be back in half an hour, okay?" "Okay." "No problem." "It´s..." "like... an image... coming from a distance." "There are two women,side by side." "I am one of them." "The otherone,I´ ve never seen... but I can recognize myself." "But I can´t remember any of that." "Must have happened far from here... or later." "Fuck it all." "The state of our misery is precise." "The state of our misery is precise." "The field is strewn with barbed wire, the sky glows red with explosions." "Since this ruin hasn´t spared the notion of culture itself... we need the courage to get rid of it." "We need to get by on very little." "When a house is already on fire,it´s absurd worrying about the furniture." "If there´s a chance worth being seized,it´s that of the defeated." "I´m not in the mood to speak Russian right now." ""MIDNIGHT"" "I don´t trust the Russian language." "actually, I only regret that... this strong notion of evil Russians have... keeps them away from a conscience, and that ´s because of Russian syntax." "It was just in case we were being heard." "There still are bugs around." "If anyone understands what I say, I expressed myself wrong." ""However, she didn´t have the sensation of falling." "On the contrary, it felt like... the ground was rising towards her at an atrocious speed."" "Suicide is the only philosophical problem worth thinking about." "You say that as a Jew or a French?" "I´m not really sure yet." "Two things give me pause... one very small, another very big." "But the small one is also big." "What ´s the small one?" "Suffering." "Suffering?" "could it be so important?" "Can it be possible to kill without suffering?" "And the second reason, the big one?" "The other world." "The other world." "The other world!" "Punishment, you mean." "That doesn´t matter." "The other world, simply the other world." "You think there is anyone who doesn´t think about the other world?" "Everyone can only judge for themselves." "Freedom will only be total when living or dying is indifferent." "That ´s the goal." "Strange goal." "Maybe no one will want to live." "No one." "Anyone can act like God doesn´t exist..." "like nothing exists, but nobody has ever tried." "On the contrary." "millions were killed or killed themselves." "Yes, but always for other reasons, always with terror never to kill terror." "Do you Iike children?" "Yes." "Therefore, you Iike life!" "Of course I Iike it." "Why?" "But you say you´II kill yourself!" "What ´s the relation?" "Life is one thing, death is another." "Life exists, death doesn´t." "I see you know your lines by heart." "In Hebrew too?" "We´re not tourists." "What does Akhim think of that?" "Akhim will help me." "He will escort you to jerusalem?" "No, he´II stay." "He doesn´t agree." "But he´II help me." "I´II go back to Paris on Wednesday." "The Meetings are over." "Good luck, olga." "Yes, uncle Ramos." "call me whenever you want." "Yes." "Yes, it ´s the possible definition." "We´re unable to free ourselves." "Good evening." "Sir, we made a video." "I couId give you a copy." "Which hotel are you staying in?" "Give it to Rusmir, he´II give it to me by Saturday." "Bye." "Champagne!" "Yes, as I was telling you... we´re unable to free ourselves." "And we call that democracy." "To CIaude Lefort, modern democracies... because they elevated politics to a distinct intellectual activity... modern democracies predispose themselves to totalitarianism." "Yes, I would say the same." "I only believe in stories whose witnesses have been beheaded." "Victim or criminal, there´s no other choice." "It ´s always possible, to avoid being judged a criminal... to accuse a bigger criminal, a monster that victimizes us." "Life is a struggle for existence, with the certainty of defeat." "Without indulging in a little cynicism, it ´s almost impossible... to avoid anger or disgust for victims because they accept their plight... because of us or despite us." "That ´s why we give voice to the victims." "That ´s why everyone is invited to express themselves as victims." "The world, today, is divided... between those who are ready to manifest their disgrace... and those to whom that public demonstration... provides a token of moral comfort for their dominant position." "We talk about the key to the problem and forget about the keyhole." "What we see before us... is a story without thought, as if inherited from an impossible will." "More than ever, without a doubt, we´re facing nothingness." "Departure by Airbus to Amsterdam." "We are calling passengers to proceed to passport and customs control." "Mr. Godard." "Hi." "I came to say goodbye." "So long and thanks." "To you too." "See you." "We have something to give you." "On behalf of olga." "It ´s the movie she made with the digital camera." "Very kind of her." "Thank her for me." "Thank you." "See you, Timka." "See you, sir." "hello?" "Yes?" "hello?" "Yes?" "It´s Garcia." "I´ m calling from Paris." "Ramos Garcia." "Yes?" "I don´t remember you." "From Sarajevo." "The interpreter." "Oh, yes, yes." "I´ m in Paris." "You saw the news?" "No." "There was a holdup in Jerusalem." "Oh, yes?" "Yes,in a movie theater." "A French Jewish girl of Russian origin." "She wanted to blow everything up alongwith herself." "It´s Olga,I´ m sure of it." "OIga?" "You saw herone night." "She tried to give you a DVD." "It´s her!" "Oh, yes." "It was her,it was Olga!" "How can you be sure?" "I´ m sure." "She gave everyone 5 minutes to get out before the explosion." "She said that if any Israeli was willing to die with her... for peace,and not forwar, she would be happy." "And then what?" "Everyone left,she was left alone." "She had a red knapsack on her shoulder." "The police killed her... before she could reach inside it." "But there were only books inside it." "KINGDOM 3" " PARADISE" "There are two women, side by side." "I am one of them." "The otherone,I´ ve never seen... but I can recognize myself." "It´s..." "like... an image... but seen from a distance." "Good morning." "Good morning." "Catch!" "Here, come on!" "That ´s it!" "Go, go!" ""STREET WITH NO RETURN"" "It was a beautiful,clear day." "You could see very far,but not the place where Olga left." "C APTlONS BY VlDEOLAR"