Discoveries from Switzerland World Cinema

The personal stories of the people from all around the world waiting for a decision in an asylum-seekers centre in one of most restrictive countries in the world, Switzerland.

A young woman is going on holiday with her parents. She narrowly escapes when her holiday fling tries to kill her, only to find out that this nasty encounter was not quite as accidental as it first seemed.

Marat works as a personal driver in Almaty, capital of Kazakhstan. When he hits a Mercedes, the nightmare begins. The loan he accepts to pay for the damages puts him at the mercy of a Mafia boss.

Children of alcoholic parents have been fighting for a precarious normality within their family since early childhood. They look after the addicted mother or father and try to stop them from drinking. They are always afraid that someone might find out and put them in a home. They feel guilty or become aggressive, cause problems at school or become addicted themselves - another single and often misunderstood cry for help in a social environment characterized by helplessness, looking away and silence.

Albania is the country in Europe that Europe probably knows the least about. Underdeveloped yesterday, Marxist today, breaking with the Kremlin, in friendship with Red China, we hardly know more. For journalists, the country of Enver Hoxha is one of the most closed 'hunting' territories in the world.

Structured as a cabaret show and composed entirely of rare visual and sound archival material, Cabaret-Berlin, The Wild Scene explores Berlin during the 20s and early 30s, when it was home to Europe’s most innovative and experimental artists, writers, and musicians, and where Jews played a leading role.

Having just moved to Amsterdam, Lou prepares her new apartment that she will share with her partner, Joel. For now though, Joel is on a trip with an intimate other. Confronted with the complexities of her non-monogamous relationship, Lou shifts her gaze to the rhythms of her new city.

1. Consoler Of the Lonely 2. Hold Up 3. You Don't Understand Me 4. Top Yourself 5. Old Enough 6. Keep It Clean 7. Intimate Secretary 8. Level 9. Steady, As She Goes 1.) The Switch And The Spur 11. Rich Kid Blues 12. Blue Veins 13. Many Shades Of Black 14. Broken Boy Soldier 15. Salute Your Solution 16. Carolina Drama

“Let us assume that Switzerland is truly a paradise. The music hereto was written long ago. We have merely forgotten it.” (Daniel Schmid) This is the material from which the most Swiss of all operas is made: the legendary Wilhelm Tell – a Swiss hero: straightforward, a primus inter pares of the indomitable freedom fighters, a good shot, surefire. A myth that becomes a poetic playground: nature in turmoil, the struggle for freedom and forbidden love. A legendary overture at a gallop with an iconic post horn motif – all this and much more in the thirty-seventh and last opera by Rossini.

As he sets off for the countryside outside Geneva a taxi-driver hears a gunshot and notices a shadowy figure slipping away from the scene. So begins a series of strange incidents.

The uneventful encounter between Eva and Rainbow will give each of them a chance to reconcile with themselves and take revenge.

The life of the actress and model Capucine inspired this film by Michel Soutter, played by Capucine herself in the company of Heinz Béat, Antoinette Moya, Corinne Corderey and Jean-Pierre Malo.

A Protestant businessman, Jean Calas, is tortured to death for allegedly killing his son to stop him becoming a Catholic. Voltaire launches a Europe-wide campaign to win rehabilitation for Calas and compensation for his family.

The first film made by Markopoulos after moving to Europe, Bliss was shot over the course of two days using only available light to create a lyrical study of the interior of the Church of St. John on the island of Hydra.

The brilliant self-taught pianist Erroll Garner left his mark on jazz forever. His song Misty, which he allegedly composed between two concerts on an aeroplane, immediately became one of the great jazz standards and is still one of the most covered ballads in the world today. Who was the man behind the ever-friendly smile from the ghettos of Pittsburgh, whose talent brought him to the biggest international stages?

Daniel has just been released from prison, where he served 13 years for a hold-up. An idealist, he's always lived on myths. Now it's time to take stock. He's determined to change his life. Pursued by his former accomplices, he embarks on a long journey. Along the way, he befriends Maxime and Marie-Ange. He falls in love with Maxime's wife, Hanna. Daniel realizes that he must break with his past, to finally live his own life; Hanna is the embodiment of hope.

Margaux, six years old, awakens early on this August morning. She goes to the window and sees her father putting objects and cardboard boxes into the car.Her mother is still sleeping. This summer morning promises to be a singular one for the little girl, who is about to experience a significant moment in her life.

If 18-year-old Sonita had a say, Michael Jackson and Rihanna would be her parents and she'd be a rapper who tells the story of Afghan women and their fate as child brides. She finds out that her family plans to sell her to an unknown husband for $9,000.

Madeleine, who runs a disco on the French-Swiss border, dreams of going to Paris to pursue a singing career. Her lover, Paul, who makes his living smuggling money, gold and goods across the border, plans to emigrate to Canada. Mali, a pretty young Algerian woman who lives in France and works in Switzerland, would like to be anywhere except where she is. Louis, born on a Swiss farm and trained as a clockmaker, would give anything to leave his mistress, Lucie, and move in with Mali.

Filippo returns to the Ticino dance school where the desire to dance was awakened in him as a child. He traces his relationship with dance, from childhood to adulthood.

A little sparrow is in awe of the ostriches with their long necks, dazzling eyes and muscular legs and wants to be just like them.

The peak of prosperity a short animation by Claudius Gentinetta

A fictionalised documentary about the great Japanese poet Bashô (1644–1694), the spiritual father of haiku poetry. A monk, portraying the poet, journeys through Japan, following Bashô's journal and writing many of his haikus. A ruminant, poetic, Zen Buddhist observation of nature – a return to the lost paradise of unspoilt nature.

A group of logs is about to freeze to death in a cold, icy desert. When they realize only themselves are possible fuel for a warming fire things start heating up.

When Santa's helper La Befana falls ill and must take off a Christmas Eve, she recruits Scarafoni to help deliver all the toys. No one but the toys knows is that Scarafoni plans to auction off the toys to the highest bidder, which means the toys won't make it to the children who have been good all year and deserve them. The toys decide to deliver themselves, and the story follows them as they struggle to avoid the heartless Scarafoni and to find their true homes.

In the 1970s, an idealistic young social worker is confronted with Switzerland's archaic mental health institutions.

Legends is one of the most musically accomplished groups of all time. With Eric Clapton on guitar, Joe Sample of The Crusaders on keyboards, virtuoso saxophone player David Sanborn and super session players Steve Gadd on drums and Marcus Miller on bass, the group's pedigree is extraordinary. They never made an album and this concert at Montreux is the only record of their stunning collaboration.

Claudio is the legendary captain of Carrarese Calcio, a leading force, both in football and family life. Everything seems to be going great: the team reaches promotion to Serie B ( higher league) and, together with his wife, he finally opens the restaurant he has always wanted to, in order to stabilise the family's economic future. The long-awaited Serie B, however, turns out to be a doom: Claudio's contract is not renewed due to his age. It will be the beginning of the decline, as an athlete and as a man. Claudio will be dragged into a vortex of events that will undermine his certainties and his own moral rigor.

Between parties and dips in the river, Lou abandons herself over the summer, navigating through her reconstituted community.

She is alcohol-phobic. He is a deep alcoholic. After their passionate night, Suze will find out she is allergic to her new friend. In this hyperbolic world, pathological characters are in search of tenderness. They suffer from bodily disorders : sentimentality for Suze and Dallas is manifested through violence, allergic reactions, occasional gunshots - "Suze" represents love as I have dreamt it: dramatic, kitsch, naive, but always sincere.

When an amateur sexting video makes the rounds on social media, several involved individuals have to face the consequences. A film that takes on the subject of sexting and cyberbullying.

August 1945. In a remote mill in American-occupied Württemberg, a quintuple murder takes place. The miller and his wife, their two sons, and their daughter Irma were executed, and the daughter was then hanged and smeared with SS runes. However, a young refugee woman named Karin Katte, whose origins and history are unknown to anyone in the village, survived the massacre by chance. The investigation is led by Dave Gladbaker, a Jewish employee of the American secret service whose parents were murdered in a concentration camp. His investigations soon focus on Karin Katte, who Gladbaker suspects must have been the real target of the attack. Katte is suspected of being a former concentration camp guard.

Can feminism and religion coexist? Inna Shevchenko of the Ukrainian FEMEN collective seeks answers to a difficult question in candid conversations with priests, imams, rabbis and other activists.

Oxana is a woman, a fighter, an artist. As a teenager, her passion for iconography almost inspires her to join a convent, but in the end she decides to devote her talents to the Femen movement. With Anna, Inna and Sasha, she founds the famous feminist group which protests against the regime and which will see her leave her homeland, Ukraine, and travel all over Europe. Driven by a creative zeal and a desire to change the world, Oxana allows us a glimpse into her world and her personality, which is as unassuming, mesmerising and vibrant as her passionate artworks.

In July 2022, a forest fire broke out on Monte Gambarogno in Ticino, Switzerland. Wound Edges is my emotional response to this landscape, filmed on 16mm and hand-developed with the forest’s ashes. Each frame carries physical traces of the land’s memory, blending destruction with resilience. The soundscape—field recordings, burned wood, contact microphones on trees, and the presence of fire—echoes the forest’s wounds. A reflection on human impact, impermanence, and the haunting beauty of transformation.

The life and work of stage designer ADOLPHE APPIA, originator of the most profound agitations in contemporary theatre. Through the dynamic alternation of animated drawings and choreographies specially conceived for the film, we discover the steps of his artistic evolution.

The documentary retraces the steps of Bruno Manser, a man from Switzerland who went to live with the indigenous tribe of the Penan in the Jungle of Borneo and endef up helping their struggle to defend their rainforest against greedy logging companies. The movie features original film, photo and voice recordings by Bruno Manser made in the 1980s, as well as new recordings showing how the life of the Penan has changed in just a few decades.

On a sailboat in the middle of the Ocean, five teenagers in rehabilitation are travelling with adults of different ages and backgrounds. Off unknown coastlines, the boat’s space becomes a huis-clos in which everyone faces their own difficulties, the challenge of living together and also the manoeuvres of sailing, the Ocean and its turmoil—until the arrival on land.

Claude Goretta brings to life the age-old tale of Orpheus and Eurydice in a fresh adaptation of Monteverdi’s Orfeo.

"Secrets of a Hollywood Star" is another documentary made after "Calling Hedy Lamarr" in 2006. It features interviews with Hedy's friends in both Europe and Hollywood and her film/studio partners.

Composer Johann Sebastian Bach is introduced to King Frederick II of Prussia in 1747. The aging composer and the young monarch clash and a battle of egos ensues.

Carl Gustav Jung interviewed on the subject of 'Sigmund Freud': how Jung met him, how he was influenced by him and where he disagreed with him. Jung talks about word association, Freudian slips, the unconscious, the Oedipus complex, the ego, archetypes, falling in love and more.

Mulhapar is a village in the wide expanses of the Punjab in Pakistan. A country associated with violence and intolerance. Beyond this sombre prejudice, the film plunges into the brimming life of a community of poor and rich people, Muslims and Christians, the young and the old, women and men. In Mulhapar, their family and individual destinies, as well as their stories and anecdotes are condensed into a vivid mosaic.

A taxi driver, a police woman, and a barkeeper are stealing a safe from a drug kingpin, soon realizing that he and his goon are after them to get it back, while the taxi driver sets up his own escape plan.

A young peasant wants to marry, but the despotic sovereign chooses the bride for one night on the basis of the "ius primae noctis" and declares her fair game. In despair, the young woman turns away from God and towards a Satanic cult. After returning from a campaign, the tyrant pursues her at the insistence of the fanatical village priest. She is confronted and murdered. This act shakes up the peasants; they rise up against the lords.

Rachele laughs at the stranger with whom she chats online. And she leads us to discover the only feeling she knows – the poisonous bond which unites her parents. In public they seem tenderly in love, but behind closed doors, it’s all possession, fear, submission and pain. Rachele wants to be different, but can she really be so, when the only form of love she knows is violence?

Mona’s marriage with Gieri has gone a bit stale after twenty years. Inspired by the unorthodox proposals of the new parish priest, she tries to revive her marriage, which causes great turmoil, not only for Gieri but the entire village community.

Celebrated Russian theatre director Anatoly Vasiliev's Asino (Italian for donkey) is an epic ode to this beast of burden. The donkey has a long cultural history dating back to Greek mythology and the Bible: Jesus rode into Jerusalem on one; Sancho Panza had a loyal donkey; Winnie the Pooh was friends with the dejected Eeyore. Donkeys stand for stupidity, stubbornness and humility.

Interspersed with jokes, visual puns, and philosophical discussions, the story follows the attempts of a girl who has spent the last year living outside her native Switzerland to rekindle a former love affair. When her immature young friend fails to demonstrate the requisite interest, she takes up with someone the boy disapproves of. When the boy kicks the man, the man leaves both the boy and his erstwhile ex-girlfriend to their own devices.

A woman disappears after visiting her daughter and realizing her presence was unwelcome by her in-laws. Some time later, a body is found in a nearby lake.

Psychological drama about a tunnel construction in the alps which becomes radioactive.

The film concentrates on Heinz Hollinger at the time of the creation of his “Concerto pour violon”, which is inspired for the most part by the tragic and very touching “œuvre” of the painter and violinist Louis Soutter, one of the many outcasts to have served Hollinger as a model. At the same time as it takes a close look at the personalities and work of these two courageous artists, the film pays tribute to Soutter, as a passionate painter who is still relatively unknown, to Thomas Zehetmair, a violinist whose inflamed style, extreme concentration and total commitment have inspired the composer and finally to Heinz Hollinger himself, a composer and conductor whose mastery, generosity and depth of musical understanding are self-evident.

The Aareklinik hospital in Bern is in a state of emergency: hostage-takers have occupied the building.

A young man lands in a cut off village in the Swiss mountains and discovers a dark secret from the past, as the villagers made a pact with the devil...

The work of legendary actor François Simon, son of Michel Simon.

When a woman steps onto the conductor's podium, she is always one of the first: the first to lead a world-class orchestra, the first to conduct the closing night of London's Proms, the first to win the German Conductor Prize. It seems as though the world of orchestral conducting might finally be ready to change its attitudes toward female conductors.