The festival was held at 3 different venues: Part 1 – “Historical films from Switzerland in German” - at cinema hall “Velikan Park” (November, 7 – 10, 2019); Part 2 – “Classical Swiss literature in German on the screen” – at the Art and Music Center Nevskiy, 20 (November, 15 – 17, 2019); and Part 3 – “The Suvorov Day” – at Suvorov State Museum (November, 24, 2019). The festival slogan this year was: “The History of Switzerland: the past and the present” devoted to the 205th Diplomatic Anniversary between Switzerland and Russia.
The festival included a special educational part about the peculiarities of Swiss classic literature in German:
“Gottfried Keller – a Classic of the Swiss Literature” – a lecture about the well-known Swiss novelist Gottfried Keller (1819 - 1890);
“Jeremias Gotthelf - a people’s writer” – a lecture about the classical Swiss novelist Jeremias Gotthelf (1797 - 1854);
“Robinsonade in a World’s Literature” – a lecture about the Robinson topic in various children books including a novel “The Swiss Robinson” by the Swiss clerk Johann Wyss (1743 – 1818).
More than 1500 viewers watched the Swiss films at “Velikan Park” (Zwingli; L’Ambassade; Das Boot ist voll; Der Grosse Kater) during the 4 days of the festival and during the 4 educational events on other days.
Swiss actor Max Simonischek came to present the movie “Zwingli” at the opening of the festival His visit to St. Petersburg was an excellent demonstration of Russian-Swiss relations, it showed the importance of the so-called cross-cultural communication.
The 6th Swiss Film Week was a great cultural event. It has become the most important annual Swiss cultural event in St. Petersburg which gives hope for the continuation of a tradition which started in 2014 when the Swiss Film Festival was just established in order to reflect the diverse culture of the entire Swiss Confederation, with its multilingualism.
