Europe’s biggest military base is situated on the outskirts of Lisbon. Soldiers following fictitious scenarios train for a future war, the neighbours hear the impact of the guns at night, a boy plays the piano. Soldiers and amateur astronomers watch through the night on their missions, ornithologists lie in wait for the mating calls of rare birds, snipers for enemies and targets. Beekeepers look after their bees, a shepherd helps a ewe giving birth: Arcadian-looking landscapes with deer and grazing sheep in the morning mist meet a modern field of Mars (“campo de marte”), as military training grounds were called in ancient Rome.

This film doesn’t hurry its observations, listening to the tales of the people as well as to the sound of the piano composition “Battle in the Stars”, inspired by the war games. It listens to the sheep, the birds, and the bees. This generates a simultaneousness – and equality – of violence, nature, people, the historic and future layers, the material and the transcendental.

Frederik Lang