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Winner of the 2022 British Independent Film Award for Best Ensemble Performance.

Set in 2006 against the backdrop of intense sectarian war, Our River… Our Sky follows the stories of a small Baghdad community trying to find some semblance of normality and hope despite unpredictable violence, turmoil, and loss.

Sara is a single mother and a novelist. As her daughter Reema sleeps fitfully against the not-so-distant noise of mortars and gunfire, she’s unable to write. Surrounded by trauma and devastation, she scours the internet for news of the city’s death toll, trying to keep track of the attacks. When her closest friend and neighbour, Sabiha, a former actress and a Christian, is forced into exile, Sara begins to fight back and recover a sense of defiance. But as the random killing escalates and gets closer to home, she begins to look for a way out for herself and her daughter…

Sara and Reema’s story is woven with that of their neighbours. These include Kamal, a former prisoner-of-war who is trying to erase the past; his pregnant wife Mona, who can’t forget her lost children from a previous marriage; her mother Nermeen, whose son was ‘disappeared’ by the regime; and the grieving Haider, a teenager slowly falling into bad company.

Sara and her neighbours invite us into their everyday lives as their world fragments and they attempt to renew a fragile sense of hope for a better future. Through the chaos and destruction, the residents never let their ambitions and desires for the future fade. Yet, they can’t help but contemplate leaving Iraq, and are forced to ask a painful question – who does Baghdad really belong to?

Dedicated to the youth of Iraq, Maysoon Pachachi’s film offers a glance at the realities of ordinary life in Baghdad, a stark contrast to past Western media portrayals of the 2003 US-led invasion and its catastrophic aftermath. A raw and powerful display of humanity, Pachachi’s film explores identity and nationalism, and what it means to belong.

Released with the support of the BFI, awarding funds from the National Lottery