Starts May 10
MSPIFF43 Audience Choice Winner
The director and star of MSPIFF 2018 audience favorite Streaker reunite for a wacky comedy that pokes fun at the multilingual Swiss. When an unexpected referendum leaves the country with only one national language, French, it catalyzes a crisis among the German and Italian speakers. Fifty-six-year-old Walter Egli (Beat Schlatter) works for the Federal Police, the organization responsible for ensuring the smooth transition to monolingualism. Despite his own limited French proficiency, he’s tasked with navigating this linguistic upheaval. He teams up with a French-speaking partner and heads to Ticino for undercover work. Their assignment: to track down a rebellious resistance group vehemently opposing the new law. Bonjour Switzerland captures the intricacies of Swiss cultural diversity and the quirks of Swiss society, weaving a tale of unexpected partnerships, cultural clashes, and the absurdities of bureaucracy in the face of a national language crisis. –Alissa Simon