ALBERTO CAVALIER

"Someday we'll laugh more again, you'll see!"

Alberto Cavalier's studio and shop is in the middle of the city, where he has been working since 1987. He took over the business from his father, and is now one of the last three gilders in Venice. His dusty studio is crammed with frames, figurines, nativity scenes, and much more.

Alberto is the father of a ten year old daughter, and he is allergic to the chemicals he has been working with for twenty years.

He is sick, doesn't know how he will be able to continue his business, and along with many others has already been dead for a few minutes.

JESSICA VALLI

"I brought a child into this world. I must be crazy!"

The mother of a son who studies philosophy and now manages the "Accademia Teatrale Veneto", which is located on the island of Giudecca. Jessica is full of big questions, and talks about her view of life and the world in an engaged and very emotional way. A world that she has to encounter with pessimism, a world in which you can't truly be happy, as she says. Not as long as there is even one person who can't live in freedom and security.

She loves the city she lives in, and hates the people who are exploiting and destroying it.

GIUSEPPE GABRIELE TOMARU

"Love is the most important thing, because without it we wouldn't exist."

Giuseppe was born in Romania and fathered a daughter in 2015 - who he can only see once a year. Since he couldn’t survive in his original profession as a waiter, he went to Spain in 2007, where he found work as a mason. The economic crisis put that to an end, and in 2011 he came to Venice, now earning his money every day from 9 to 5 on Campo San Stefano as Charlie Chaplin.

Giuseppe accepts his life with a shrug. His faith in God and his daughter give him strength to get through it, and he hopes that he can realise his dreams someday.

SILVIA LONGO

"We are all part of the same fabric, and I am a thread!"

Silvia Longo was born in Venice, where she attended the "Istituto D'Arte Del Tessuto". She's been working as a weaver on looms from the last century for more than fifteen years. She has woven for the Pope, for the Kremlin, and of course several Hollywood stars wear her creations. She takes care of the whole process, from the preparation of frames, loading the looms, to programming (with hammer and punching iron) the hole cards, and she also knows how to mend the looms - one of the last with this know how.

Silvia talks joyfully about her job, which fills her with happiness every day, as she believably affirms.

LUCIANO ANDREANI

"The devil in purgatory scrubs us like crazy, to rub the sins away - especially Miss Eberhardt, the religion teacher".

I met the Swiss theatre-maker, artist, and antique dealer in the Venetian residence of Pro Helvetia, where he works on drawings dealing with the theme of "bad girls". Luciano has been a freelancer since 1968. For many years I've known him as someone who relies entirely on his own inspiration, and who allows for little compromise.

His meditative, fantastic stories paraphrase the subjects addressed in the film, expanding them by an essential dimension.