The title refers to the strip of land along the Franco-Swissfrontier, an area of chronic unemployment and an emotional grey zone.Tanner's host of characters, united only by their wanderlust, are alldirectly or indirectly involved in smuggling goods and souls across theborder. They include Madeleine, who runs a disco but dreams of a popmusic career in Paris; her garage-mechanic lover, Paul, who wants toemigrate to Canada; Mali, an Algerian living in France and working inSwitzerland, and Jean, a formerly content farmer now smitten with Mali.A score by Terry Riley captures the sense of entrapment as a police webtightens around them and a free-form narrative becomes excruciating.