Theatre of War
Directed by Lola Arias
Argentina, Spain, Germany • 2018 • 73 mins. • In English, Spanish with subtitles
Today, the Falklands War of 1982 lives on in the collective memories of the Argentinian and British soldiers who fought it, and Arias takes that aftermath as the core material comprising her wholly surprising and unique debut feature. Gathering two groups of soldiers, Arias asks these men to reminisce and bond over a shared experience of war, but, more importantly, to create empathy between the groups and thereby exposing their underlying humanity. At once highly artificial and deeply emotional, Theatre of War is one of the year's most consistently eye-opening documentaries: "a work of linguistic, colonial, gender and generational confrontation that pushes towards the empathy of collectivity. The trauma of the past is expressed in the woundedness of the present and through this expression finds a type of sanctuary." —Carolina Benalcázar, Another Gaze.
Sponsored by The Oregonian
Appears in: 42nd Portland International Film Festival, PIFF 42: Documentary Views