According to Pereira

The setting is 1938 Lisbon. Marcello Mastroianni is a journalist, widowed and reclusive, drawn to the literature of the past and oblivious to the present. He hires a young assistant, and meeting this purportedly apolitical young man who is deep into the underground antifascist struggle is the beginning of Pereira’s awareness of the political turbulence all around him—and the beginning of his intellectual reawakening. Mastroianni approaches his role with “intelligence and humor . . . fleshing out Antonio Tabucchi’s formidable creation as a pathetic figure revitalized by political events” (David Rooney, Variety). Ennio Morricone’s score draws on Portuguese tunes from the era.