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THE SILENT WALLS

By Gabriela CALVACHE

Documentary - Completed 2010

The Silent Walls (Labranza oculta) portrays the lives and aspirations of workers restoring Quito historic center, while reflecting on the fates of those who have been forgotten by history

- Year of production
- 2010
- Genres
- Documentary
- Countries
- ECUADOR
- Languages
- SPANISH
- Budget
- 0 - 0.3 M$
- Duration
- 66 mn
- Director(s)
- Gabriela CALVACHE
- Writer(s)
- Gabriela CALVACHE
- Cast
- Segundo CAIZA, Luis CANDO, Luis CHULLI, Luis TÚQUERRES, Julio AMBAS
- Producer(s)
- Paola DE LA VEGA (GESCULTURA), Gabriela CALVACHE (CINEÁTICA FILMS), Daniel KLEIN SUSSMAN (CINEÁTICA FILMS)
- Synopsis
- Every city has its secrets, but it is probably inside houses, behind their silent walls, where they are most intense and human. The Alabado House was built in 1671 as part of Quito’s colonial Old City, surviving centuries of earthquakes, poverty and decay. Over the past five years, dozens of manual laborers have been working to restore it.
  Official documents date the Spanish foundation of Quito to 1534, dutifully recording the names of its European settlers and architects. Located in the heart of the Andes, it was the first city to become a UNESCO World Cultural Heritage site. But its miraculous beauty conceals a long and tragic history. For it was the oppressed indigenous masses who built the Old City, the largest in Latin America.
  Labranza oculta (The Silent Walls) is a documentary about the lives behind the walls of history. The workers restoring the Alabado House surprise and charm us by telling their tales, sharing their dreams and aspirations. We accompany their daily routine: molding the bricks and cutting the cane with the methods of seventeenth-century builders. Then comes payday, the architects’ inspection, laborers bathing under the patio faucet after an exhausting day of work. As witnesses to these personal stories, we travel into the lives of the “forgotten.” It reminds us that history is built by people, the anonymous mass that sweats and toils.
- Partners & financing
- Consejo Nacional de Cine de Ecuador
  Fondo de Salvamento del Patrimonio Cultural de Quito
  LAFARGE
  ADELCA
  TERMIKÓN
- Production schedule
- 2006-2010
- Beginning of shooting
- Jun 01, 2007