Cédric Leproust

After Angelica is disturbed by her adult son Mattia in her relaxation bath, she is finally able to let go. She begins to masturbate in front of the poster of footballer Valenti, her son's idol. Suddenly, Valenti's gaze fixes on her… a cry for help. An absurd euphoria spreads: the miracle crystallises into a struggle for power and intimacy between mother and son.

It’s the end of the day on a Swiss train. Yalini, a Tamil-Swiss woman, receives a call from her parents. As the conversation becomes sensitive and tense, one of the passengers approaches her and expresses annoyance that she’s speaking too loudly. On that train journey, Yalini faces two worlds that do not understand her.

Claude Goretta directed “L'invitation” in 1973. For filmmaker Lionel Baier, born in 1975, it is like a “travelling companion”, to adapt Serge Daney’s expression. He feels it is definitive proof that a Swiss can be deeply Chekhovian. The young filmmaker goes to Geneva to ask his elder how he achieved the whoosh of water effect in the film, why attention to detail matters so much, and how to film great actors such as François Simon. This encounter with Claude Goretta – but also with Isabelle Huppert, Nathalie Baye, Michel Robin and Frédérique Meininger – leads one of the greatest of Swiss filmmakers to open up about his work.