This elegant documentary about a bucolic Portuguese military base offers surprising glimpses of the soldiers’ off-duty pursuits
Tiago Hespanha’s Campo is an elegant, ironic pastoral, a documentary depicting aspects in the daily life of an enormous military base in Portugal – and yet humorously or subversively homing in on those things that are unexpectedly bucolic.
There is off-duty birdwatching going on there, also beekeeping, stargazing and even lambing. Hespanha’s camera will discover green fields, dreamy skies, striking cloud formations, and also concentrates on the civilian existence of the soldiers’ families. A teenage boy is shown playing a composition of his own on the piano called Battle in the Stars with some concentration. But then again, straightforward military manoeuvres are also shown, with some soldiers getting yelled at by their sergeant. One soldier is accidentally injured and howls that his father will shoot himself with shame when he finds out.