Socrates

The sudden, unexpected death of his mother puts 15-year-old Socrates in a precarious position. A child of the São Paulo slums, he now has to survive on his own. At first, he hides his mother's death, telling her employers that she's just sick so he can take over her cleaning job. But when this ruse fails, his struggle for survival turns more desperate, as fraught as his search for love in the arms of a troubled older boy. Socrates is an astonishingly assured first feature whose cinematic fluency renders his minuscule budget irrelevant and utilizes a cast and crew of underprivileged Brazilian youth.

PRECEDED BY
Dreamer
Directed by Marcos Davalos
9 mins, USA