At the very south, a squad of 5 Chilean soldiers and its commanding officer are sent to the border with Argentina sometime in 1978 in the brink of a war between both countries over 3 desperately lonesome islands nobody until then used to care about. They have to explore the area and report "every suspicious activity". But while they get there, a soldier breaks the compass, they get hopelessly lost and are forced to dig a trench in the middle of nowhere, ignoring if that spot is in fact still homeland or enemy's territory. When they think nothing worse could happen, suddenly a squad of 6 Argentine dig another trench a couple of meters to the East and point their arms at them. There's no water around to be found, and the only order they get through their vanishing radio is to sit and wait. Problem is, nobody knows if the war will start or when and they've only got around 20 bullets each to defend the country...
This film has a lot of subtleties for those who can see them. It is not only a universal story about war and peace, but a description of a difficult vicinity. Through this very real approach to being friend or foe, drawing the frontier "two steps to the left" or "two small steps to the right", Chilean and Argentine have been neighbors for the best part of 500 years, feeling very much part of the same family and at the same time quite different people.
One look says it all: it is at times difficult to recognize each countries uniform. Both are standard military green and have the same helmets, alas if one part uses goggles on them. But when it comes to behavior, Chilean are stiffer and disciplined, while Argentine are more relaxed and less hierarchical.
The film draws most of its conclusions from a small patch of land, divided by a very fuzzy line that both squads have drawn one day by common accord to avoid useless quarrel. In fact, nobody knows where the limit really runs. It is an abstraction. Both groups arrive at the scene willing to defend this idea to death, and end up having to wait for the order to do it. Meanwhile reality sets in and catches them up: once, it's the Chilean who need penicillin for a wounded soldier, another time it's the Argentinians who wish to eat meat from a calf given away by a shepherd to the Chilean. Both squads end up sitting on the border roasting it together, taking pictures of one another, telling stories, and playing (soccer) football. In the end, pride and honor take a different, much more approachable,dimension. When war fails to set in, Chilean and Argentine become once again that what they are: just neighbors, very similar people. In fact, as one of the soldiers puts it, "some families cross the border every day for work's sake, and they do it 'just like that'".
The film empathizes once and again the vastness of the pampas and the impossibility of drawing a "border" there. This complete nothingness is underlined by the tiny number of soldiers of each squad: 6 on each side. These proportions cannot but entirely dwarf the heroic intentions of "defending the motherland" at all costs, etc. The reason for the possible war were as ridicule as the situation itself: 3 lonesome islands at the end of the world, nobody's concern until two countries were willing to kill and destroy for it. But that's exactly what Argentinians and Chilean have been doing for centuries: fight for land. Sometimes over 1 000 000 km in Patagonia, sometimes about 3 tiny islands. But when these matters are settled, both countries unite very easily. This jumping from cold to hot mood in a matter of minutes portraits very truly the Latin character: getting exited about small things and arguing to death and then falling into each other's arms laughing about the silliness of it all.
The picture is not about archetypes of peace and war, it doesn't reach Olympic heights or neck breaking depths, but its insights are fresh because it shows the same eternal questions viewed by two peoples that commonly don't show up in our cinemas every day. It is an honest, well crafted movie, and surely entertains while making you think.
This film has a lot of subtleties for those who can see them. It is not only a universal story about war and peace, but a description of a difficult vicinity. Through this very real approach to being friend or foe, drawing the frontier "two steps to the left" or "two small steps to the right", Chilean and Argentine have been neighbors for the best part of 500 years, feeling very much part of the same family and at the same time quite different people.
One look says it all: it is at times difficult to recognize each countries uniform. Both are standard military green and have the same helmets, alas if one part uses goggles on them. But when it comes to behavior, Chilean are stiffer and disciplined, while Argentine are more relaxed and less hierarchical.
The film draws most of its conclusions from a small patch of land, divided by a very fuzzy line that both squads have drawn one day by common accord to avoid useless quarrel. In fact, nobody knows where the limit really runs. It is an abstraction. Both groups arrive at the scene willing to defend this idea to death, and end up having to wait for the order to do it. Meanwhile reality sets in and catches them up: once, it's the Chilean who need penicillin for a wounded soldier, another time it's the Argentinians who wish to eat meat from a calf given away by a shepherd to the Chilean. Both squads end up sitting on the border roasting it together, taking pictures of one another, telling stories, and playing (soccer) football. In the end, pride and honor take a different, much more approachable,dimension. When war fails to set in, Chilean and Argentine become once again that what they are: just neighbors, very similar people. In fact, as one of the soldiers puts it, "some families cross the border every day for work's sake, and they do it 'just like that'".
The film empathizes once and again the vastness of the pampas and the impossibility of drawing a "border" there. This complete nothingness is underlined by the tiny number of soldiers of each squad: 6 on each side. These proportions cannot but entirely dwarf the heroic intentions of "defending the motherland" at all costs, etc. The reason for the possible war were as ridicule as the situation itself: 3 lonesome islands at the end of the world, nobody's concern until two countries were willing to kill and destroy for it. But that's exactly what Argentinians and Chilean have been doing for centuries: fight for land. Sometimes over 1 000 000 km in Patagonia, sometimes about 3 tiny islands. But when these matters are settled, both countries unite very easily. This jumping from cold to hot mood in a matter of minutes portraits very truly the Latin character: getting exited about small things and arguing to death and then falling into each other's arms laughing about the silliness of it all.
The picture is not about archetypes of peace and war, it doesn't reach Olympic heights or neck breaking depths, but its insights are fresh because it shows the same eternal questions viewed by two peoples that commonly don't show up in our cinemas every day. It is an honest, well crafted movie, and surely entertains while making you think.