Jürg Hassler

A Swiss political documentary about the Zurich youth unrest of 1968

Roger is a young, dashing banker full of boyish self-confidence. He has a highly successful business, smuggling black money across the border for reinvestment. But then a split second reaction changes his entire life. Flagged down one day by a customs officers, Roger loses his cool and makes a run for it. His only means of escape: diving headlong into Lake Constance, thereby catapulting himself out of his life as a banker and into a totally new universe, populated with shy mermaids decked out in Lara Croft gear, and cunning magpie witches in helicopters. As in a Grimm Brothers fairy tale, Roger has to pass three tests to cast off the witch’s curse and find happiness. His underwater journey through an intoxicatingly beautiful Switzerland is enhanced by the enchanting songs of sirens – a fable full of lust for life and love.

Thirteen Swiss filmmakers, each from their own point of view, chronicle and reconstruct the narrative of Swiss cinema, from its beginning to the present day, and in doing so, retrace the history of the country.

A remarkable collection of examples of dissolute, free, experimental, and avant-garde films. Hassler added dream and fantasy sequences from more conventional films to fragments from complete or incomplete and far-reaching experiments. Images were taken from reality on 16 mm and 8 mm film stock to create a new reality.

A Swiss political documentary about the Zurich youth unrest of 1968

A Swiss political documentary about the Zurich youth unrest of 1968

Roger is a young, dashing banker full of boyish self-confidence. He has a highly successful business, smuggling black money across the border for reinvestment. But then a split second reaction changes his entire life. Flagged down one day by a customs officers, Roger loses his cool and makes a run for it. His only means of escape: diving headlong into Lake Constance, thereby catapulting himself out of his life as a banker and into a totally new universe, populated with shy mermaids decked out in Lara Croft gear, and cunning magpie witches in helicopters. As in a Grimm Brothers fairy tale, Roger has to pass three tests to cast off the witch’s curse and find happiness. His underwater journey through an intoxicatingly beautiful Switzerland is enhanced by the enchanting songs of sirens – a fable full of lust for life and love.

Thirteen Swiss filmmakers, each from their own point of view, chronicle and reconstruct the narrative of Swiss cinema, from its beginning to the present day, and in doing so, retrace the history of the country.

A remarkable collection of examples of dissolute, free, experimental, and avant-garde films. Hassler added dream and fantasy sequences from more conventional films to fragments from complete or incomplete and far-reaching experiments. Images were taken from reality on 16 mm and 8 mm film stock to create a new reality.