The ocean contains the history of all humanity. The sea holds all the voices of the earth and those that come from outer space. Water receives impetus from the stars and transmits it to living creatures. Water, the longest border in Chile, also holds the secret of two mysterious buttons which were found on its ocean floor. Chile, with its 2,670 miles of coastline and the largest archipelago in the world, presents a supernatural landscape. In it are volcanoes, mountains and glaciers. In it are the voices of the Patagonian Indigenous people, the first English sailors and also those of its political prisoners. Some say that water has memory. This film shows that it also has a voice.
The Pearl Button is a 2015 Chilean documentary film directed by Patricio Guzmán. It was screened in the main competition section of the 65th Berlin International Film Festival where it won the Silver Bear for Best Script. It won the Lumière Award for Best Documentary at the 21st Lumière Awards. The filmmaker has described the work as part of a triptych with Nostalgia for the Light and third film The Cordillera of Dreams focusing on the Andes.
