Once a child prodigy, the musical career of violinist Laerte (Lázaro Ramos) has not gone as planned. His once-in-a-lifetime audition with the São Paulo Symphony Orchestra is a spectacular failure and with bills piling up, an offer to teach a high school violin class in Sao Paulo’s notorious Heliopolis neighborhood cannot be turned down. Reluctant and defensive, Laerte anticipates trouble in this tough environment and finds it: unruly, untrained and unable to read music, his students carry the weight of the favela on their young shoulders, yet through it all a passion and purpose begins to emerge for teacher and students alike.
With the program’s future resting on an upcoming concert and the pressures of gang violence and police brutality growing louder off stage, Laerte’s greatest performance might simply be in bringing a glimmer of hope into their lives, as well as his own.