Manuela suffers from a lung disease that forces her to wear a respirator to provide her with oxygen. She’s socially isolated and manages her internal rage by drawing comics. One day, her apartment complex hires a new janitor: Hakim, a penniless immigrant whom Manuela befriends.Whitewash looks at the pressure felt amongst Iranian immigrants in Canada to change their given names to Western names to increase their chance of getting a job, and the consequences that develop due to this act of cultural and identity erasure. The film examines the extent of discrimination against immigrants and asks how race can contribute to the rates of unemployment for some communities in Toronto and what it will take to create equality in the workplace.
