ABSTRACT
Andrei Tarkovsky’s Nostalghia (1983, Nostalgia) is at once a magnificent and unnerving exposé into the anatomy of exile and human estrangement. In this penultimate film by the iconized Russian director, the presence of music is pared down to a minimum, being limited to recurring snippets of a Russian folk song, a short passage of Chinese music, and a few brief excerpts from Ludwig van Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony and Giuseppe Verdi’s Requiem. By focusing on these musical fragments and how they relate to the film’s diegesis, its broader existential themes, and the representation of its main characters, this essay demonstrates how music is centrally involved in the multi-layered examination of nostalgia, displacement, alienation, and the prospect of redemption that is at the heart of Nostalghia.
