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LUZ

A FEATURE FILM WRITTEN BY EDUARDO MONTEIRO

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NARRATIVE OUTLINE

After losing his job and the relationship that anchored him, Eduardo, a 43-year-old Brazilian advertising professional, feels adrift in a silence he cannot escape. Guided by his enduring interest in astronomy and in an attempt to distance himself from his own collapse, he travels alone to the Atacama Desert in search of silence, of stars, perhaps of some forgotten version of himself.

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In his luggage, he carries a quiet anguish: the sensation of falling behind, of having missed the timing of his own life.

 

​From the very beginning, everything unravels: a missed flight, lost luggage, and a burnt-out phone. Stripped of control, Eduardo stumbles upon an eccentric group of travelers led by Mário, a theatrical Chilean guide with a huge heart, colorful scarves, and a poetic way of seeing the world from his worn-out, overly decorated van.

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Inside the van, an unlikely group comes together: Bia, an expansive Brazilian with a loud laugh and sharp gaze; Sarah, a neurotic planner whose fears make her both annoying and endearing; Tyler, an affectionate man whose cluelessness amuses everyone; Seung, a reserved young Asian man whose calm presence carries unexpected weight; and Maja, a striking traveler whose enigmatic aura draws Eduardo’s attention. But above all, his eyes always return to Luz and Eduardo Muñoz, a serene Chilean couple whose quiet complicity unsettles him.

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As the van crosses surreal landscapes - the Valle de la Luna, geysers at dawn, turquoise lagoons shimmering under the thin air - Eduardo drifts between isolation and connection.

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Nights in San Pedro bring music, cheap bars, clumsy attempts at companionship, and the fragile humor that binds strangers. He feels invisible and exposed at the same time, mocked by the younger travelers as if he were already displaced by age.

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Yet, little by little, fragments of tenderness emerge: conversations with Tuti, the extravagant owner of the Don Raúl hotel; strange encounters with a mysterious street flutist; a drunken karaoke night where vulnerability surfaces; and intimate, heartfelt dialogues with Bia.

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Through echoes of local music and culture, and flashes of philosophy and astronomy, the film expands beyond a road trip. It becomes a meditation on how the vast and the intimate coexist in every human experience. 

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The turning point does not come under the desert sun, but in the intimacy of Luz and Muñoz’s apartment in Santiago. A moment of sushi and wine unfolds with apparent simplicity, until Eduardo notices a subtle gesture that changes everything.

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The truth emerges with disarming naturalness: Muñoz is blind. Eduardo, who had traveled with them for days without realizing it, now sees reflected in them his own blindness. Not of the eyes, but of the spirit.

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From that revelation on, the entire journey acquires new meaning. The desert, once a landscape of despair, becomes a stage for acceptance. In Muñoz’s quiet resilience, Eduardo finds a reminder that life is not about control, nor about chasing answers with urgency, but about the courage to ask for help, the humility to soften the ego, and the strange clarity that comes from seeing the world through someone else’s eyes.

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LUZ is not the story of a man who solves his life in the desert, but of someone who learns to see beyond himself. It is a sensitive meditation on human suffering, the weight of loneliness, the impermanence of life, and the allure of the unknown.

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Through landscapes that seem to belong to another planet, and a humor as fragile as it is liberating, the film reminds us that what truly matters often lies beyond what the eyes can see.

“Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known.”

Carl Sagan

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   MOVIE INFO   

SLOGAN

What we see is never everything

LOGLINE

After losing his job and his relationship, a man in the midst of an identity crisis travels alone to the Atacama Desert in search of silence and answers.

 

Among strangers and a quietly singular Chilean couple, he discovers that what truly matters is often beyond sight.

SYNOPSIS

After losing his job and his relationship, a Brazilian man in the midst of an identity crisis sets out alone for the Atacama Desert, seeking silence, stars, and a way out of his quiet despair.

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A disastrous start - missed flight, lost luggage, and a burnt-out phone - marks the beginning of a trip where he joins an unlikely group of travelers and a quietly singular Chilean couple whose bond will change the way he sees life.

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Through surreal landscapes, offbeat humor, and moments of unexpected tenderness, what began as an escape becomes a journey of connection, contemplation, and self-discovery.

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CENTRAL THEME

Through silence, contemplation, and unexpected encounters, the protagonist learns to soften his ego and embrace the fragile beauty of human connection.

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A meditation on love, loss, and the things we cannot always see with our eyes; reminding us that sometimes we must lose in order to truly feel again.

NARRATIVE ARCHITECTURE

The screenplay of LUZ is built on solid storytelling principles and a personal style of writing that values subtlety, visual poetry, and emotional precision.

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Every scene, gesture, and image serves a dramatic purpose within the characters’ emotional arcs. The Licancabur volcano, the black screen, the binocular, the night sky, the Wow Radio, and the mysterious figure are not mere aesthetics; each holds symbolic weight in the protagonist’s inner journey and in the transformation of others.

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The narrative trusts the audience’s sensitivity; instead of explaining, it invites the viewer to feel and discover through sensations, visual echoes, and quiet metaphors.

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ARTISTIC REFERENCES & INSPIRATIONS

The references that helped shape LUZ blend personal passions, extensive research, visual delicacy, and deeply intimate emotions.

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The film’s aesthetic resonates with sensitive works that treat time, silence, and intelligent dialogue as essential to storytelling. Films such as “Paris, Texas”, “Y Tu Mamá También”, “The Diving Bell and the Butterfly”, “The Motorcycle Diaries”, “Incendies”, “Roma”, “Departures”, “A Hidden Life”, “Invisible”, “Nomadland”, “Sideways” and “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty”, among others.

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In music, inspiration comes from composers like Jóhann Jóhannsson, Brian Eno, Ólafur Arnalds, Max Richter and Loscil, who translate the desert’s vastness and the soul’s depths into sound.

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Chile’s cultural roots appear in the voices of Inti-Illimani, Violeta Parra, La Noche, Zalo Reyes and Fernando Milagros, creating a bridge between the Atacama’s landscape and the emotional memories of its characters.

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There is also the freshness of Bratty, Gepe, Tom Bernardes and Nick Mulvey, whose music breathe with the story, alongside nostalgic appearances by Madonna and Phil Collins. Melodramatic ballads from the 1980s add unexpected depth and humor, playing from the fictional 103.3 Radio Wow Atacama, a recurring sound element in the film’s universe.

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Visually, LUZ remains natural and honest, with real sunlight, the authentic sounds of the desert, and frames that embrace silence, emptiness, and the unique atmosphere of the local nature. These elements highlight the film’s sensory, existential, and deeply human dimension.

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GAGS

Throughout the narrative, LUZ weaves small comedic moments that bring freshness, a sense of complicity, and growing intimacy with the characters as the story unfolds.

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Mario’s obsession with Phil Collins; Eduardo’s recurring encounters with an emblematic street flautist; Tyler’s constant inattention when speaking with Seung.

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With apparent simplicity, these gags carry layers of meaning and operate subtly, creating emotional bonds with the audience without breaking the film’s lyrical tone.

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EASTER EGGS

LUZ is filled with hidden layers. Carefully placed easter eggs weave subtle references to philosophy, astronomy, personal affections, and contemporary pop culture.

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These discreet details add depth for those who enjoy reading between the lines; every gesture, object, or scene may hold a greater meaning for those who notice, always without disrupting the film’s poetry.

PHILOSOPHY, ASTRONOMY AND HUMAN CONDITION

LUZ offers a subtle critique of modern society, not through confrontation but through quiet contrast, touching on themes of narcissism, vanity, egocentrism, relentless acceleration and the pressures of self-demand.

 

As the characters let go of their digital performances and surrender to the silence of the desert, echoes of four philosophers I personally admire begin to emerge:

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•   Lucian Blaga (incomprehension)
•   Byung-Chul Han (egocentrism)
•   Rainer Maria Rilke (interiority)
•   Yukio Mishima (impermanence)

 

The screenplay was carefully written to gently weave in their central ideas: the mystery of what remains hidden, the fading of the ego, the power and value of artistic presence and the fleeting beauty of existence.

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It carries an echo of astronomy, touched by the poetic vision of Carl Sagan, opening a space for humility before the infinite and for tenderness toward the shortness of our lives.

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These reflections are not presented as direct references, but as a quiet philosophical breeze that moves through the film, subtly shaping its emotional and existential atmosphere.

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TONES & GENRES

The film’s predominant tones are poetic and contemplative; melancholic, with social critique and touches of acid humor; sensitive, with restrained emotion and a minimalist aesthetic; and marked by visual lyricism inspired by Terrence Malick, Alfonso Cuarón, Wim Wenders, Hirokazu Koreeda and Chilean directors like Pablo Larraín, Andrés Wood and Dominga Sotomayor.

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Its blended genres include existential drama as its foundation; an emotional road movie that follows a journey and transformation; and subtle human comedy with gags and eccentric characters.

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“Someday, anywhere, at any place, inevitably, you will find yourself.

And that, only that, may be the happiest or the bitterest of your hours.”

Pablo Neruda

CHARACTERS

The construction of the character arcs in LUZ follows a classical logic of transformation; discreet, yet profoundly human.

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Each character undergoes an emotional journey that reveals itself not through obvious statements, but in silences, gestures, and subtle choices that define who they are.

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Behind the lightness of certain moments and the humor of some situations lies a carefully crafted structure that guides the audience through layers of growth, loss, hope, and reconnection.

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The film’s dramatic architecture draws from time-honored narrative principles, yet it seeks to remain spontaneous and organic, like life itself.

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The changes within the characters do not shout; it is in the whisper, trusting the audience, that the film finds its truth.

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MAJA

A woman in search of meaning. The desert awakens a sleeping courage in her.

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TYLER

A tourist of himself. Awkward, funny, and full of truths he doesn’t understand.

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MARIO

Twenty-three years on the road and a heart that knows every curve of the wind.

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FLUTE PLAYER

A provocative artist who understands the soul of local culture.

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SEUNG

A calm gaze that captures the invisible, photographing what words cannot say.

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SARAH

Reserved on the surface, but carrying a world of unsaid things behind her eyes.

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EDU MUÑOZ

The man who sees without sight. A quiet lighthouse in the vastness of the desert.

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ANDINE WOMAN

The embodiment of the protagonist’s anguish and internal pain.

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BIA

A brazilian with a loud laughter, strong opinions, and a heart that feels before it thinks.

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TUTI

Old, vain, and full of spark. She laughs at the world and shelters those lost in it.

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LUZ

She sees what eyes can’t reach. Her gentleness lights even what seems lost.

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YOUTUBERS

A portrait of a society surrendered to narcissism and superficiality.

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EDUARDO MONTEIRO

Eduardo’s journey begins in chaos. A lost job, a broken heart, a missing suitcase, and a fried phone. He traveled looking for silence, but found confusion instead.

 

Yet, among people who are also wandering through their own deserts, something starts to shift. He meets a Chilean couple whose quiet strength and love begin to open his eyes to a different kind of seeing.

 

Through laughter, mistakes, and unexpected tenderness, Eduardo starts to understand that clarity doesn’t come from escaping life, but from allowing himself to be touched by it.

 

In losing almost everything, he discovers that sometimes it takes strangers to show us who we really are.

AUDIENCE & UNIVERSAL APPEAL

LUZ is a film for anyone who has ever felt small or lost in the face of the world. For those who don’t have all the answers, yet still insist on searching for beauty.

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It speaks to an adult, sensitive audience without elitism; to men and women of all ages who value real stories, with characters that mirror what we all are: melancholic, impatient, loving, funny, insecure, sharp… and above all, human.

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LUZ naturally resonates with festival audiences, but also reaches a wider, curious public, even those who might not catch every metaphor. And that’s okay. The film also smiles at those who simply want to feel.

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It’s for those who like to laugh and be moved; for those who have crossed (or are still crossing) their own personal deserts, and can recognize life’s greatness in small and unlikely encounters.

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It’s for those who seek cinema with soul, with no intention to impress, but every intention to touch.

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For those who value an honest screenplay, one that surprises gently and reminds us that life can indeed be lighter. With more acceptance, and less self-imposed pressure.

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“In the midst of winter, I found there was, within me, an invincible summer.”

Albert Camus

MOODBOARDS

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MESSAGE OF THE FILM

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LUZ is a gentle reminder that life is brief.

And beautiful precisely because of that.

* This sequence illustrates the progressive vision loss caused by Retinitis Pigmentosa.

THE JOURNEY THAT INSPIRED ME TO WRITE "LUZ" 

The journey that led me to write LUZ could have been just another one, like any other vacation we take.

 

It was in a brief instant, just a few seconds, that everything shifted onto a different path.

 

I carried with me a silent sense of defeat; the impression that I had arrived late to my own life. I traveled in search of air, of some kind of silence that could rescue me from the noise within.

 

The desert received me with losses and stumbles, as if it wanted to strip me of everything unnecessary. Without luggage, without a phone, without certainties, I had to face myself without disguises. Alone. Just me with myself.

 

And then came people. Laughter, conversations, gestures shared in the vastness of the Atacama. In that mineral solitude, I discovered that true companionship is not born from perfection, but from the fragility we recognize in one another.

 

And it was in that simple dinner, in the dry sound of a toast, that a discovery changed the way I looked at life.

 

I understood that, sometimes, what is essential happens quietly, in the delicacy of the everyday.

 

LUZ is born from there.

 

From a journey that began as an escape and ended as a discovery.

From the lesson that we all go through some kind of intimate, personal desert.

From the certainty that what we see is never everything.

STRUCTURE AND STORY MAP

Act 1: The Weight of the Luggage

Block 1: A DISASTROUS START

• Scene 01 - Security Point

• Scene 02 - I Was Just Thinking About Something

• Scene 03 - Visible Effects in 4 Minutes

• Scene 04 - Reflections

• Scene 05 - Maleta Amarilla

• Scene 06 - Bag of Chips

• Scene 07 - El Guardián del Pueblo

• Scene 08 - The Room

• Scene 09 - The Yellow Poncho

• Scene 10 - It Works

• Scene 11 - Qurintucha

• Scene 12 - El Cielo Más Claro del Mundo

• Scene 13 - Sharp Snap

• Scene 14 - Scream

• Scene 15 - The Mysterious Figure

Block 2: WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE?

• Scene 16 - Tengo Un AirTag

• Scene 17 - Sólo Abren a las 10

• Scene 18 - Mário Atacama Premium

• Scene 19 - I Got It, Thank You

• Scene 20 - Call the Paparazzo

• Scene 21 - Phil Collins

• Scene 22 - Andean-Romantic Sanctuary

• Scene 23 - Tocayos

• Scene 24 - Esta Es el Alma de Atacama

• Scene 25 - Tuti con T

• Scene 26 - Muddy Water

• Scene 27 - Loneliness

• Scene 28 - The Myth of Perfect Love

• Scene 29 - She's a Capricorn

• Scene 30 - The Mysterious Figure Again

Act 2: Silent Transformations

Block 3: BONDS, SILENCES AND A SPECIAL PAIR

• Scene 31 - On the Way to the Geysers

• Scene 32 - Wild Atmosphere

• Scene 33 - Let's go, Edu, let's go!

• Scene 34 - Put the Phone Down, Bia

• Scene 35 - Chaski Sonqo

• Scene 36 - Indian Rock

• Scene 37 - Encarna al Neruda

• Scene 38 - T de Traigo Buenas Noticias

• Scene 39 - Ahora No Vas a Parar?

• Scene 40 - Under Pressure PLOT POINT 1

• Scene 41 - Too Much Pisco Sour

• Scene 42 - Don't Let Me Out of Here

Block 4: THE DESERT MIRROR

• Scene 43 - A Lagoon for the Morning After

• Scene 44 - Lagunas Escondidas

• Scene 45 - Promise of Silence

• Scene 46 - Maybe That's What Life Is All About

• Scene 47 - Returning to San Pedro

• Scene 48 - Pachamama

• Scene 49 - Silence

• Scene 50 - You Are More Than Welcome to Try

Block 5: FAREWELLS AND SURPRISES

• Scene 51 - Thanks, Atacama

• Scene 52 - Hijo de Puta

• Scene 53 - They Are About to Close the Gate

• Scene 54 - Que Alegria Te Ver Aqui, Meu Filho

Act 3: Eduardo, Eduardo & Luz

Block 6: EPILOGUE

• Scene 55 - Bienvenido, Tocayo

• Scene 56 - 4 Seconds That Changed Everything PLOT POINT 2

• Scene 57 - Eduardo

• Scene 58 - Eduardo & Luz

• Scene 59 - Closing Text

• Scene 60 - Title Cards

TECHNICAL SHEET

PROJECT OVERVIEW

• Original title: LUZ

• Genre: Poetic drama / Emotional road movie

• Estimated duration: 120 minutes

• Format: Feature film / Color / Digital

• Country of origin: Brazil / Chile

• Languages: Portuguese / Spanish / English

• Status: Completed Screenplay / In Development

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LOCATIONS

• Brazil: Opening scene / airport interiors

• Santiago, Chile: Urban settings / flashbacks / Luz and Eduardo's apartment

• Atacama Desert, Chile: San Pedro de Atacama and region

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SCREENPLAY INFO

• Software: Final Draft 13

• Pages: 137 pages

• Language: Written in Portuguese (English version available)

• Registration USA: WGAW #2307192

• Registration Brazil: Biblioteca Nacional #000984.0313143/2025

• Actual version: LUZ V.22 (revised)

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KEY CREDITS

• Writer (Original screenplay): Eduardo Monteiro

• Director: [to be defined]

• Co-director: Eduardo Coelho

• Director of photography: [to be defined]

• Editing: [to be defined]

• Executive production: [to be defined]

• Associate production: [to be defined]

• Sound design: [to be defined]

• Production & Art direction: [to be defined]

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