I have never been a resident of a seminary or a school, my only experience of « concentration » having been a few months in the army. But since my teenage years, I always hated those places where everything is possible. I was very young when I discovered the novel of Vergilio Ferreira « Manha Submersa », and I had been immediately seduced by the rigorous and detailed way he descrivbed a certain society, living in a country under dictatorship, which tried to stifle desire under a paternalist despotism. So, when I got the opportunity to carry out my first film, I chose this novel with which I could identify and that I would have liked to have written. Besides, this project corresponded to a sort of personal challenge : to direct a film with $100 000 budget requiring a historical reconstitution, different sets, the fact of working with children and a lot of actors, a narrative structure close to melodrama which I tried to get away from by using a rigorous cinematographic writing and « neutral » direction. I had to succeed in dealing in dealing with all those elements. The result is there : a film entirely made by Portuguese people, from the writing to the technical finishing, actors and crew included. The main issue is to know whether protuguese cinema is possible. My film tries to play a part in that. Lauro ANTONIO