When an environment is dramatically disturbed, what possibilities for life remain? On the slopes of the Navarrese Pyrenees, the construction of the Itoiz dam in the 1990s flooded seven villages and three nature reserves. A strip of bare land, 592 metres above sea level, today marks a dividing line within the landscape of the valley. Below that level, the water; above it, life goes on.

After having fought for years against the flooding of their villages, the inhabitants of the valley are the distant observers of the changes that took place. Ilargi is a cattle rancher and Javier is a forest ranger. They each embody a very different relationship with the place and the animals under their care; the first moves in short distances, in a relationship involving touch; the second stays away, watching through a telescope. Different distances coexist in the disturbed territory, in a strong duality of elements, between life and death.