Route 206

The working day in an 80-year-old textiles factory in northern Portugal is very much one of routine for the hundreds of men and women who work there. The camera records the mechanical ballet of the winding and weaving machines that ceaselessly process thread. The people beside them look like imperfect copies, lacking in precision. Director Catarina Alves Costa sets out to discover what kind of lives the factory's employees are living. What were their dreams? Why did they stop studying, and how old were they then? People of varying ages provide a variety of answers: some were short of money, others didn't enjoy going to school or quit for personal reasons, others simply didn't want to study. Today, however, some of them have returned to the schoolroom - though learning and working means their tasks are doubled. All the free time that remains to them is spent in sleep. The film gently mimics the tempo of the factory, in which time ebbs and flows with regularity. The director sensitively guides us into the darkness of the factory floor and back to the light of day, where the plant is observed by senior citizens, themselves former employees.