Skin of Glass

Duration

1x 90' HD', 1x 52' HD'

Producer/Director

Denise Zmekhol - Director

SYNOPSIS

SKIN OF GLASS follows director Denise Zmekhol’s journey after discovering that her late father’s most celebrated work as an architect, a modernist glass skyscraper in the heart of São Paulo affectionately known as the Pele de Vidro (“Skin of Glass”), has become occupied by hundreds of homeless families.

The film delicately interweaves the personal and political in a poetic and cinematic meditation on displacement, inequality, and loss. In the wake of a shocking tragedy that took place during the film’s production, Zmekhol connects with the residents of the Pele de Vidro and is brought face to face with the intimate, human consequences of an exploding population and global housing crisis.

Denise Zmekhol - Director

Skin of Glass began as a personal journey to reconnect with my late father through one of his most important works, a modernist glass tower he designed in São Paulo in the 1960s. When I discovered that the building had been abandoned and occupied by hundreds of unhoused families, that journey became something much bigger.

Through the building and the people whose lives became intertwined with it, the film explores housing, inequality and the right to a place to call home. What began as a search for my father ultimately revealed a Brazil I had been taught to ignore.

I wanted to tell this story with humanity and empathy, using my own journey as a way into a much larger and universal question: who do our cities belong to?

Festivals

*Jury Award | Les Rencontre du Film d'Art, Saint-Gaudens, France
*Best US Latinx Film of the Year | Cinema Tropical, NY, USA
*Honorable Mention | Arquitectura Film Festival Santiago, Chile
*Best Feature Documentary | ArchFilmLund, Sweden
*¡Viva el Cine! Audience Favorite Award | Mill Valley Film Festival, USA
*Best Feature Documentary | BARQ International Architecture Film Festival Barcelona, Spain
*Best Feature Award | Milano Design Film Festival, Italy
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