Based her grandfather’s boyhood in St. Louis, Yasmin Gorenberg tells a story of the pain passed from refugee parents to their children and the hope that can overcome it.
40 Nickels captures the image of a generation of immigrants to the United States in the 1920’s and 1930’s and through this spotlights the effects of the 1919 pogroms in Eastern Europe.
This is a film about parents and children: how trauma never leaves a family, and how hope and resilience are also passed down. It asks the question: Can a new generation look at the world with wonder rather than fear?