Swiss competition 2025
The films in this year’s Swiss Competition reveal an increasing shift towards comedy – ranging from madness and extravagance to spooky fairy tales (“Progress Mining”).
We get to experience world history in short form (“Storytelling”), witness a mysterious mass poisoning (“The Vegetarian Congress”) and encounter a diva who lives with a tapeworm to slim her figure (“Tapeworm Alexis & the Opera Diva”). A sparrow wants to be as strong and elegant as an ostrich (“Ostrich”), dental plaque fights for survival in the oral cavity (“Caries”) and a guitarist searches in vain for peace and quiet in a mountain hut (“In Tune”).
Experimental approaches and ironic, critical perspectives are also featured: for example, when a banana ballet pokes fun at consumerism (“Labouyi Bannann”) or when a predetermined framework has to be broken (“Frames”).
For all their light-heartedness, however, the films also tackle serious topics such as illness and bullying, sometimes subtly, at times directly (“Hunting”, “I’m not sure”, “Cottage Cheese”, “Ouais”). And even the ironic tone of some of the works does not prevent us from delving deep into the genre; we accompany a police raid filled with television images (“TV or the Disturbance on Forest Hill Road”) and learn a bitter lesson in the heart of Tokyo’s underworld (“Double or Nothing”).
From a total of 80 Swiss submissions, the Selection Team has chosen 16 films that will compete for the favour of the audience and the jury in two programmes.