Juan Alvarez, a Spanish refugee in Canada, shoemaker, picks up at his home Manuel, a 12-year-old Portuguese teenager, whom he teaches to read, to assert his rights and who speaks of the Spanish civil war.
Acting
Francisco Rabal carries decades of Spanish exile in every glance.
Writing
Dialogue that makes shoe repair feel like revolutionary praxis.
Director
François Labonté
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Francisco Rabal was a genuine Spanish Republican exile; his casting layers documentary weight onto fiction.
The Portuguese community in 1990s Montreal was largely ignored onscreen—Labonté's focus on Manuel rather than Juan centers migrant kid agency rare for the era.
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