Films: I Was a Swiss Banker

I Was a Swiss Banker

Switzerland, 2007, 75 Minute Running Time
Genre/Subjects: Art, Experimental, Foreign
Program: Contemporary World Cinema
Language: Danish, English, German, Swedish English Subtitles

DIRECTOR: Thomas Imbach
Producer: Bachim Film, Thomas Imbach
Editor: Thomas Imbach
Screenwriter: Jürg Hassler, Thomas Imbach
Cinematographer: Jürg Hassler, Thomas Imbach
Principal Cast: Beat Marti, Laura Drasbæk, Anne-Grethe Bjarup Riis, Sandra Medina

Roger (Beat Marti) has developed a lucrative trade: sneaking black-market money across the border, where it can be reinvested without any legal hassles. But when a customs officer demands to search him, the only way Roger can save himself is by diving headfirst into Lake Constance, money bag still in hand. He struggles underwater in the dark until finally he is saved—by a mermaid, who then disappears. When he makes it back onto dry land, it is only to be cursed by a loudly cackling witch—who challenges our initially slick, self-absorbed antihero to fall in love with one of three women who will cross his path; if he can’t, he must become her lover. Though he succeeds, the witch tricks him, keeping him for herself after all. Only the mermaid can break the spell—and requite his love too.

In this thoroughly enjoyable foray into the world of the modern fairy tale, filmmaker Thomas Imbach departs from his trademark experimental style. Here, instead of the harrowing inward journey of the cool-toned Lenz or the unflinching yet poetic true-crime vision of Happiness Is a Warm Gun (both of which are also playing in this year’s festival), we have a lighthearted romance that Imbach, working from a well-structured narrative script, sets against the glorious landscape of Switzerland—imbuing it with dreamy color and real warmth among ultimately appealing characters. An eclectic soundtrack completes the pretty picture.

Also by this director

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  Happiness Is a Warm Gun

  Switzerland , 2001 , 95 min. Mixing fact and fiction in an attempt to comprehend the killing of German Green Party activist Petra Kelly, Swiss filmmaker Thomas Imbach imagines a now humorous, now poetic passage from life to death for her and her much older lover.... more
• 

  Lenz

  Germany , 2006 , 96 min. An emotionally erratic filmmaker makes a pilgrimage to Vosges to do research on his namesake—an eighteenth-century German Romantic poet who went insane. When he abandons his project to reunite with his young son and ex-wife instead, he tips toward madness himself.... more