This tale by Robert Musil, enigmatic and free of psychology, has something to do with this. Agustina Bessa Luís, writing with no hesitations, leaves very concrete traces in the fathomless spaces of Musil’s novel without saying everything at the same time, thus intriguing us. The unspoken is very seducing to me. Everything that goes on between the Portuguese woman and her husband (Von Ketten) relies on the unspoken. No one knows exactly if they did exist. The truth behind that doesn’t even matter. This story, in a specific period of History, close to the Bishopric of Trent, takes us to a series of facts that reflect to our own times in many ways, if we consider that our ancestors weren’t different, just living in a different place. As Musil said, it is not that hard to see a modern civilization man in the Gothic man or in the ancient Greek man.

​

I am not interest where things come from but where I can take them. If it’s true that one only makes one film throughout his life, it is also true — at least in my own case — that one breaks that same film in a thousand pieces to do it in a different way. In that sense, I will always be an apprentice.

​

I am not moved by in historical reconstructions. I do not wish to restore the past, especially such a remote one — I don’t even think that’s possible or makes sense. I specifically like the contemporary side of Musil’s text.

​

Films save nothing. Also, we are not in a position to save ourselves, let there be no doubt. When the world outside carries its weight on our language – upon my tongue, treads hard the ox o' the adage – and all discourses are blend together, where smart people and charlatans use the same formulas with minor differences, I believe that The Portuguese Woman will speak for itself.

I am interested in all that is decisive in life, challenges destiny and happens beyond our comprehension. As Musil said, somewhere: human greatness has its roots in irrationality. If I film a tree, a river, a road, that is the only thing I want to understand and express.