As a privileged teenager living in an affluent suburb of Rio de Janeiro, Jean has little to worry about beyond games, grades and girls. But as his overbearing father drags the family into debt, Jean is forced into a change of lifestyle which opens his eyes to the world beyond his ‘casa grande’ – not least that of the feisty, mixed-race firecracker Luiza. Cultures, classes and generations collide in this engrossing coming-of-age drama from Brazil.

After being released from prison, Dr. Nise da Silveira is back at work in a psychiatric hospital on the outskirts of Rio de Janeirom where she refuses to employ the new and violent electroshock in the treatment of schizophrenics. Ridiculed by doctors, she is forced to take on the abandoned Sector for Occupational Therapy, where she would start a revolution through paintings, animals and love.