The Congress of Penguins (1993)

На далеких островах северных широт, в условиях вечной мерзлоты охотники за трофеями заняты поисками бесценных сокровищ «черного» рынка – бивней доисторических мамонтов. Одна из таких экспедиций обнаруживает прекрасно сохранившиеся останки древнего зверя. Поразительная находка вызвала интерес в биотехнологическом мире. Фрагменты животного с живыми клетками доставляют в лабораторию по клонированию в Южной Корее. Ее честолюбивый глава Хван У Сок берется возродить мамонтов к жизни и совершить революцию в науке и судьбах человечества…

Filmmaker Peter Mettler embarks on a mission that takes him around the world. He is determined to record the diverse modes of transcendence that people in different cultures adopt in order to live life to the fullest. As he traverses civilization and wilderness and encounters a range of lifestyles and ideas, the filmmaker's mind-expanding trip around the world grows into a poem of images and sounds, reflecting the fragmented but alluring worlds it attempts to capture.

Документальная картина о монашеском ордене, члены которого хранят обет молчания. Действие фильма происходит в картезианском монастыре Гранд Шартрез, затерянном во французских Альпах. На всем протяжении этой ленты зрители почти не слышат человеческой речи; тишину прерывает только звон колоколов. Фильм отображает каждодневную жизнь монахов, живущих в полумраке: кельи монастыря освещаются лишь свечами. Спят они на лавках, застеленных соломой, а свои жилища обогревают лишь небольшими жестяными печками. Покрытые снегом альпийские горы служат величественным фоном их духовным поискам. По ночам монахи собираются в каменной часовне, где царит пронизывающий холод, садятся на пол и поют грегорианские песнопения.

At the far end of the Alaskan peninsula, for filmmaker Roman Droux a childhood dream comes true. He discovers together with the bear researcher David Bittner the universe of wild grizzlies. The two adventurists face bears at smelling-distance, experience the struggle for survival of a bear family and witness dramatic fighting scenes. Driven by a desire to explore the unknown the film tells a personal story of wilderness, framed in breathtaking pictures of unique creatures.

Croatia, 7th of January 1992: In the middle of the war, a young journalist's body is discovered dressed in the uniform of an international mercenary group. Twenty years later, his cousin Anja Kofmel investigates his story.

Pascal, 53, and Carole, 28, are shepherds. In the month of November 2010, they embark on their long winter transhumance: four months during which they will have to cover 600 km in the Swiss-French region, accompanied by three donkeys, four dogs and eight hundred sheep. An exceptional adventure is about to begin: they brave the cold and the bad weather day in day out, with a canvas cover and animal skins as their only shelter at night. This saga reveals a tough and exacting profession, requiring constant improvisation and unflinching attention to nature, the animals and the cosmos. An eventful journey with surprise encounters, moving reunions with farmer friends, nostalgic figures of country life that is shrinking away fast. Αn adventure film, a contemporary road movie, a reflection of our current world, which takes us back to our roots and our inner questions.

A documentary. David Sieveking takes the advice of his idol, David Lynch and tries out Maharishi Mahesh Yogi's transcendental meditation technique.

The incredible story of how the mummified corpse of a 40-year-old man was discovered by a hunter in one of the most remote parts of the country. The dead man's detailed notes reveal that he actually committed suicide through self-imposed starvation only the summer before. Liechti's film is a stunning rapprochement of a fictional text, which itself is based upon a true event: a cinematic manifesto for life, challenged by the main character's radical renunciation of life itself. (peterliechti.ch)

Movie about prisoners in prison "Thorberg"

Switzerland is presently the only country in the world where suicide assistance is legal. Exit: The Right to Die profiles that nation's EXIT organization, which for over twenty years has provided volunteers who counsel and accompany the terminally-ill and severely handicapped towards a death of their choice.

Above and Below is a rough and rhythmic roller coaster ride seating five survivors in their daily hustle through an apocalyptic world. A journey of challenges and beauty in uncomfortable places: Rick & Cindy, Godfather Lalo in the flood channels deep down under the shiny strip of Sin City. Dave in the dry and lonesome Californian desert and April in simulation for a Mars mission in the Utah desert. Through the hustle, the pain and the laughs, we are whisked away to an unfamiliar world, yet quickly discover the souls we encounter are perhaps not that different from our own.

(Re)immersing himself in body building, David Nicolas Parel endeavours to follow his younger brother as he trains for the Arnold Classic – Arnold, from the famous Austrian/American actor and politician. Convinced he is the one who inspired this passion, he worries about the risks this sport has on his brother’s health and aspires to strengthen their now strained bond. A film on the edge.

Ироничный, вдохновляющий, а порой и жестокий фильм о музыке и балете показывает жизнь и страсти, царящие за кулисами одного из самых престижных храмов культуры в мире.

In 1964, Che Guevara asked the young Jean Ziegler to stay in Switzerland to fight in the "Monster brain" capitalist. Since then, Jean Ziegler nerve stops fighting against injustices as a public writer, a speaker and as a Kofi Annan collaborator. During a trip to Cuba, his ideas are challenged by what he discover on the island.

A documentary of an expedition to Churchill, Manitoba to film the Northern Lights.

On the way through a world of sounds and noise – with Manfred Eicher, the oustanding discoverer and mediator of contemporary music and founder of the music label ECM. On this journey we are meeting musicians and composers, but also people and places which are connected with him and with each other. We are encountering stories, landscapes, cities, disputes and hugs, tranquillity, hectic pace, work, self-doubt, joy, passion.

Ceschi and Stamm's documentary tells the incredible story of Monika Krause, a former East German citizen, who became Fidel Castro's Sexual Education Minister. After 20 years in Cuba, Krause set the Cuban sexual revolution in motion: in favor of a woman's right to sexual fulfillment and legal abortion, and against exclusion of homosexuals, she acquired the title "Queen of Condoms". A film about potent female agitators, staunch macho men and Caribbean love lives.

По современному Тегерану — с чайными садами, золотыми закатами и фейсбуком через анонимайзер — едут двое молодых парней, Ануш и Араш. Они нервно курят и высматривают полицию: в багажнике — вертушки. У них заготовлена легенда про свадьбу родственника, но страшная правда звучит так: они диджеи, играют хаус, называются Blade & Beard и регулярно проводят секретные танцы, куда просят подружек взять хиджаб на случай рейда.

An avant-garde documentary film on English guitarist, composer and improviser Fred Frith.

How can structures, which take up defined, rigid portions of space, make us feel transcendence? How can chapels turn into places of introspection? How can walls grant boundless freedom? Driven by intense childhood impressions, director Christoph Schaub visits extraordinary churches, both ancient and futuristic, and discovers works of art that take him up to the skies and all the way down to the bottom of the ocean. With the help of architects Peter Zumthor, Peter Märkli, and Álvaro Siza Vieira, artists James Turrell and Cristina Iglesias, and drummer Sergé “Jojo” Mayer, he tries to make sense of the world and decipher our spiritual experiences using the seemingly abstract concepts of light, time, rhythm, sound, and shape. The superb cinematography turns this contemplative search into a multi-sensory experience.