Theatre of War

In 1982, Argentina and Britain fought over the Falkland Islands. 1000 soldiers from both sides were killed. Thirty-five years later, director Lola Arias brings together six veterans, three from each side, in an attempt to adapt their experiences onto film. Through patient camera work and editing, Arias recreates the war as a sequence of male rituals that repeatedly damage its heroes’ souls. Although seeming to focus on the creative process: polished texts, casting, etc., she in fact, produces a therapeutic process that gradually positions the participants—and viewers—at a now historical vantage point from which they can identify the pain they shared, and perhaps find solace in this recognition.